<-I  f  I C 

9 .£/>•<- 


^Doctor  of 


1 


Oownaencl  c 


1()03 


Copyright,  1903,  by 
CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 


Published,   August, 


TROW  DIRECTORY 

PRINTING  AND   BOOKBINDING  COMPANY 
NEW  YORK 


URL 

SRLF; 


TO 

JAMES    O'G.    DUFFY 

AUTHOR   AND  SCHOLAR 
CRITIC    AND    FRIEND 


2,8-03 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 


MAJOR  ANTHONY  PHCEBUS 
WHYOT,  confident  in  his  per 
suasive  powers,  as  he  was  confident  that 
he  possessed  all  other  faculties  desirable  in 
unlimited  degree,  had  determined  to  rea 
son  with  his  nephew.  Women  have  long 
since  learned  that  profound  physiological 
fact  that  the  way  to  a  man's  heart  —  so  at 
least  we  are  told  —  is  through  his  stomach. 
Through  some  little  attrition  with  the  gov 
erning  sex  during  a  long  life  Major  Whyot 
had  mastered  that  lesson.  Therefore,  as 
a  judicious  preliminary  to  the  reasoning 
process,  there  was  to  be  a  dinner. 

The  Major  had  reserved  a  private  room 
in  the  Loyal  Club  for  this  purpose.    Reso- 

CO 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

lutely  turning  his  back  upon  the  blandish 
ments  of  Broad  Street,  he  had  so  seated 
himself  —  and  at  the  table,  for  the  ap 
pointed  hour  had  arrived  —  that  his  ex 
pected  guest  would  be  compelled  to  face 
the  light.  It  was  indeed  a  subdued  light 
that  came  through  the  handsome  hangings, 
for  the  Loyal  Club  was  second  to  none 
in  the  quiet  elegance  of  its  fittings,  but  it 
was  enough  for  the  Major's  design.  The 
Major  lived  in  a  blaze  of  internal  glory. 
Externally,  however,  subdued  lights  were 
in  consonance  with  his  tastes,  which  were 
modesty  and  simplicity  carried  to  the  height 
of  arrogance ! 

Like  all  Philadelphians  who  belonged 
to  his  exclusive  set  the  Major  was  a  bon 
vivant,  an  epicure,  at  whose  feet  Lucullus 
might  have  sat  —  and  learned  lessons.  If 
he  had  ever  heard  of  Lucullus  and  his 
prodigalities,  however,  the  Major  would 
have  despised  him.  The  Roman  epicure, 
naturally  antedating  William  Penn,  was 
nothing  to  the  Major.  He  had  just  chosen 

[2] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

a  luncheon,  the  details  of  which  shall  be 
left  to  the  reader's  imagination  and  expe 
rience,  but  which  the  Major  felt,  with  rea 
son,  could  not  fail  profoundly  to  move  his 
young  nephew.  The  order  had  scarcely 
been  delivered  when  to  him  entered  the 
young  man  expected. 

Doctor  William  Penn  Whyot  in  no  way 
resembled  his  uncle.  The  Major  was  typi 
cal  of  old  Philadelphia.  The  doctor  was 
not  typical  of  any  especial  section  of  the 
city  —  not  even  of  Philadelphia  itself !  By 
a  singular  atavism,  for  which  in  his  secret 
heart  the  doctor  devoutly  gave  thanks,  his 
characteristics,  physical  and  mental,  which 
will  appear  in  due  course,  were  those  of 
his  grandmother  on  the  paternal  side. 
Suffice  it  for  the  present  to  say  that  he 
wasn't  a  bit  of  a  Whyot  either  in  thought, 
action,  or  appearance. 

That  is  why  the  Major  was  so  elabo 
rately  preparing  to  reason  with  him.  Not 
on  account  of  his  alien  appearance  —  from 
the  Whyot  standpoint  —  oh,  no.  That  was 

[3] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

a  hopeless  condition,  although  some  change 
might  have  been  effected  —  from  the  Why- 
ot  point  of  view  again  —  if  William  Penn 
had  only  dispensed  with  that  pointed  Van 
Dyck  beard  he  wore.  There  wasn't  a  single 
Whyot  in  the  whole  long  —  and  it  must 
be  confessed  somewhat  ghastly  —  line  on 
the  walls  of  the  Pine  Street  house,  thought 
the  Major  with  constantly  renewing  re 
sentment,  who  had  ever  worn  his  beard  in 
that  way.  Most  of  them  had  no  beards 
at  all,  and  those  who  condescended  to 
mustaches,  singularly  resembled  "  Uncle 
Phoebus,"  as  the  doctor  irrelevantly  called 
the  Major  in  his  mind. 

There  was  no  doubt  about  the  Major. 
He  was  a  pocket  edition  of  his  ancestry. 
Two  hundred  years  of  unquestioned  social 
supremacy  had  refined  away  their  strength 
and  sublimated  their  weakness,  and  the 
Major  was  the  legitimate  resultant.  He 
was  a  dapper  little  man  with  thin  aristo 
cratic  features,  white  closely  cut  hair  and 
a  very  white  mustache,  whiter  by  contrast 
[4] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

with  his  very  red  face.  Except  the  doctor 
he  was  the  last,  as  he  was  physically  — 
also  mentally  —  the  smallest  of  the  famous 
Philadelphia  Whyots.  He  did  not  realize 
it,  of  course,  but  there  had  been  a  steady 
degeneration  in  the  line,  and  the  Major 
was  the  scion  of  a  noble  plant  nearly  gone 
to  seed. 

Nevertheless  he  still  possessed  some  of 
the  outward  marks  of  his  ancient  race. 
After  his  lights,  albeit  they  were  not  brill 
iant  indeed,  he  was  a  gentleman  —  that  is, 
if  you  measured  him  by  his  own  definition 
of  what  a  gentleman  should  be.  One  thing 
he  did  possess,  and  that  was  a  full  measure 
of  the  courage  which  had  made  the  orig 
inal  Huguenot,  de  Vyault,  brave  the  press 
ure  of  the  Grand  Monarch  until  the  revo 
cation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  beggared 
him  in  fortune  and  drove  him  to  Eng 
land;  a  resolution  which  enabled  him  to 
survive  the  disgrace  of  being  forced  into 
manual  labor  for  a  livelihood. 

The  Major's  title,  for  instance,  was  no 
[5] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

gim-crack  epithet  begot  by  militia  service, 
but  was  honestly  come  by.  He  had  vol 
unteered  promptly  in  '61,  resigning  his 
cornetcy  in  the  City  Troop  to  accept  a 
captaincy  in  one  of  the  Pennsylvania  regi 
ments.  In  the  first  battle  he  had  been  des 
perately  wounded  while  leading  a  charge 
at  the  head  of  his  men.  He  had  been 
promoted  for  his  gallantry  and  had  forth 
with  resigned  his  commission  when  the  war 
became  so  common  that  everybody  came 
crowding  into  the  ranks  and  he  had  to  take 
orders  from  "  the  son  of  a  tinker,  by 
Jove!  "  —  which  was  more  than  he  could 
stand. 

The  fortunes  of  the  original  de  Vyault 
had  gone  very  low  in  England.  Poverty 
of  goods  had  induced  some  transient  pov 
erty  of  spirit  in  the  earlier  descendants  — 
alas  soon  lost!  At  their  nadir  of  misfort 
une,  however,  they  had  fallen  under  the 
influence  of  William  Penn,  turned  Quaker, 
and  with  him  had  come  to  America. 

The  first  Quaker  Vyault  —  they  discard- 
[6] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


ed  the  "  de  "  then  —  who  came  over  had 
been  a  shoemaker.  Malicious  people  said 
a  barber,  but  the  family  always  insisted 
upon  St.  Crispin  as  the  patron  saint  of  the 
early  dispensation.  Really,  when  you  think 
of  it,  that  was  as  low  down  as  a  Vyault, 
speedily  metamorphosed  into  Whyot,  could 
possibly  go.  They  had  begun  at  the  feet 
of  humanity  in  the  new  land,  therefore, 
and  it  was  evidence  of  their  ability  that 
they  so  speedily  rose  to  its  head.  Such  a 
line  of  magistrates,  justices,  financiers, 
merchant  princes,  soldiers,  and  sailors, 
could  not  be  exhibited  by  any  other  family, 
either  in  the  old  Proprietary  Province,  or 
the  succeeding  Keystone  State.  They  had 
attained  the  zenith  of  their  fortunes  at  the 
beginning  of  the  century  —  since  then  their 
progress  had  been  the  other  way.  They 
had  at  first  stood  still,  then  they  had  gone 
back.  The  Major  was  the  last  limit  — 
downward;  the  doctor  a  protest  —  up 
ward. 

The  family  had  gathered  much  money 
[7] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

in  their  long  advance.  In  its  descent  it 
had  managed  to  retain  it,  even  to  increase 
it.  The  conservatism  of  Philadelphia  had 
replaced  the  hot  French  blood,  and  what 
ever  they  had  they  held  on  to.  The  Major 
had  the  most  of  the  property  now,  although 
the  doctor  was  not  without  a  comfortable 
fortune.  When  the  words  "  much  money  " 
are  used  it  may  not  be  inferred  that  the 
Major's  fortune  was  a  vast  one.  It  was 
ample  for  the  Major,  for  any  moderate 
gentleman.  It  might  have  run  to  a  million, 
possibly,  but  there  was  nothing  vulgar 
about  it  like  the  fortunes  of  the  nouveaux 
riches,  who  lined  Fifth  Avenue,  New 
York,  with  their  palaces  and  filled  New 
port  with  the  sound  of  their  extrava 
gances. 

The  Major  had  always  enjoyed  plenty, 
and  possibly,  therefore,  he  was  not  a  judge 
of  relative  values,  but,  had  he  been  forced 
to  choose,  he  would  have  preferred  his  old 
Pine  Street  house  and  his  high,  square  pew 
in  St.  Christopher's  —  like  many  Quakers 
[8] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

they  had  become  Church  of  England  peo 
ple  and  then  Episcopalians  of  the  "  high  " 
variety  in  due  course  —  to  almost  all  of  his 
other  worldly  possessions.  For  the  Major 
belonged  to  the  oldest  and  most  exclusive 
set  in  Philadelphia.  Fortunately  for  Phila 
delphia  and  the  rest  of  the  country  there 
were  not  many  of  them.  Birth,  brains, 
money,  unless  they  had  the  hall-mark  of 
Philadelphia  upon  them,  were  as  nothing 
to  the  Major  and  his  kind.  The  preten 
sions  of  the  Southern  cavalier  amused 
him.  The  extravagances  of  the  New  York 
millionaire  awakened  his  contempt.  The 
arrogance  of  the  Boston  brain  was  —  like 
the  brain  itself  —  a  thing  incomprehensible 
to  him. 

There  were  other  people  in  Philadelphia 
besides  the  Major  and  his  friends,  some 
thing  like  a  million  and  a  quarter  of  them, 
but  they  did  not  count.  They  were  simply 
there.  They  paid  the  interest  on  his  bonds, 
enhanced  the  value  of  his  stocks,  and  so 
contributed  to  his  income;  aside  from  that 
[9] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

function  he  had  little  knowledge  of,  and 
less  interest  in,  them.  He  was  thoroughly 
satisfied  with  himself  and  his  friends,  with 
his  position  and  his  family,  except  his 
nephew,  the  doctor.  There  never  had  been 
a  physician  among  the  Whyots  before. 
That  was  bad  enough,  "  beastly  pill  rollin' 
business,"  so  the  Major  phrased  it.  He 
could  still  recall  how  terrible  had  been  the 
shock  when  the  doctor's  choice  of  a  pro 
fession  had  been  announced  to  him.  What 
was  the  need  of  any  profession?  The  first 
Whyots  had  been  workers,  beginning  with 
the  shoemaker,  but  conditions  had  altered; 
there  was  now  no  necessity  for  them  to  do 
any  work  more  laborious  than  cutting  cou 
pons  or  preparing  the  list  of  guests  for  the 
annual  Assembly  balls. 

Why  had  his  nephew  not  elected  to  be 
come  a  gentleman  of  elegant  leisure  like 
himself?  the  Major  wondered,  painfully. 
But  he  had  managed  to  survive  that  blow 
and  had  become  fairly  reconciled  to  it 
when  the  news  was  carefully  broken  to 
[10] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

him  by  his  sister  and  the  doctor's  aunt,  a 
widow  who  stood  in  a  dead  mother's  place 
to  the  young  man,  that  the  hope  of  the 
family  was  engaged  to  be  married!  The 
breaking  of  the  news  was  accompanied  by 
the  usual  feminine  evidences  of  internal 
cardiac  disintegration.  There  was  weeping 
and  wailing,  and  but  that  even  the  best 
artificial  sets  did  not  gnash  successfully, 
the  old  Biblical  conditions  would  have 
been  reproduced,  even  to  teeth. 

The  violence  of  Madame's  feelings  were 
evidenced  by  this  scene.  The  Whyots 
were  distinctly  undemonstrative,  they 
prided  themselves  upon  it,  and  that  his 
sister  should  have  given  way  to  such  emo 
tions  and  in  the  presence  of  her  brother  — 
for  whom  she  felt  a  holy  awe  as  the  head 
of  their  ancient  and  honorable  house  — 
was  testimony  to  the  depth  and  intensity 
of  her  grief  and  disappointment.  There 
was  excuse  for  it,  though,  and  while  the 
Major  could  not  forgive  such  a  display,  he 
condoned  it,  when  he  learned  —  here  was 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


the  rub  —  that  William  Penn  Whyot  was 
going  to  marry  a  nobody ! 

Her  father  did  not  have  a  house  on 
Pine  Street,  would  not  have  lived  on  Pine 
Street  if  the  whole  street  had  been  given 
to  him,  although  he  had  money  enough  to 
buy  the  whole  street  if  he  had  wanted  it. 
No,  he  lived  out  with  the  common  people 
on  North  Broad  Street,  miles  above  Mar 
ket  Street,  where  he  had  the  largest  and 
handsomest  house  in  many  blocks. 

"  Why  didn't  he  go  to  New  York,  damn 
him,"  soliloquized  the  Major,  "  where  he 
belonged,"  and  live  on  Fifth  Avenue  over 
looking  the  Park,  which  appeared  to  be 
laid  out  for  the  exclusive  delectation  of 
mortals  favored  by  Plutus  and  the  kindred 
gods?  He  was  an  anachronism,  an  ab 
surdity  in  Philadelphia.  He  had  no  pew 
in  old  St.  Christopher's  either.  If  he  had 
ever  entered  that  ancient  edifice  he  would 
have  considered  it  a  musty,  fusty,  uncom 
fortable  old  building,  any  way.  On  the 
contrary,  he  actually  occupied  the  finest 

[12] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

seat  in  the  brand  new  Holy  Angels' 
Church;  of  which,  in  his  grim  way,  he  was 
one  of  the  strongest  supporters — finan 
cially,  that  is,  for  his  piety  was  in  an  in 
verse  ratio  to  his  contributions. 

Philip  Chalden  lived  in  Philadelphia  be 
cause  he  owned  the  town.  If  choice  had 
directed  his  footsteps  to  New  York  he 
probably  would  have  owned  that  city  also, 
but  Philadelphia  satisfied  him  as  a  posses 
sion.  The  majority  of  the  citizens  of 
Philadelphia  fatuously  believed  that  they 
governed  themselves.  A  large  portion  of 
the  minority  did  not  care  who  governed 
them,  so  long  as  they  were  let  alone.  An 
other  small  but  very  aggressive  portion 
knew  that  Philadelphia  was  governed  by 
Philip  Chalden,  and  they  endeavored  to 
make  it  interesting  for  him  by  their  efforts 
to  shake  off  their  thralldom.  A  few  hun 
dreds,  of  the  St.  Christopher's  set,  of  which 
the  Major  was  the  leading  exponent,  nei 
ther  knew  nor  cared  nor  believed  any 
thing  about  it.  If  they  thought  of  it  at 

[13] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

all,  in  some  wildly  intellectual  moment, 
they  were  persuaded  that  they  governed 
not  merely  Philadelphia,  but  the  world 
itself.  They  were  the  people  and  wisdom 
would  die  with  them. 

The  fatuous  majority  referred  to  used 
to  hold  elections  from  time  to  time  and  put 
a  new  man  in  the  City  Hall  —  at  least  he 
wore  trousers  and  looked  like  a  man  out 
wardly,  although  he  was  merely  a  puppet 
—  who  would  put  other  men,  so  called, 
but  like  unto  himself,  in  various  positions 
of  trust — and  profit  —  in  his  gift,  such 
as  the  Director  of  Public  Safety,  the  chiefs 
of  the  various  subordinate  bureaus,  and  so 
on.  The  little  group  of  reformers  used  to 
meet  enthusiastically  and  with  one  unpur- 
chasable,  and  also  largely  unsalable,  paper 
of  small  circulation,  as  their  organ,  furi 
ously  attack  the  government. 

The   government   was   Philip    Chalden. 

He  moved  the  Mayor,  the  Mayor  moved 

the   Director,   the   Director  his    chiefs  of 

bureau,  the  chiefs  of  bureaus  their  various 

[14] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

subordinates,  till  the  bottom  was  reached, 
and  the  mass  of  the  people,  reformers  and 
all,  were  moved  —  and  great  was  the  move 
ment  of  them !  Chalden  moved  the  people 
in  a  great  many  ways.  For  instance,  he 
owned  the  street  railways  and  nobody  was 
transported  except  in  his  cars.  The  re 
formers  were  transported  with  rage,  but 
that  counted  for  nothing.  The  press  of  the 
city  with  few  exceptions  was  against  the 
government,  the  exceptions  being  the  pa 
pers  that  Chalden  owned.  He  owned  all 
that  he  wanted,  or  enough  of  them  to  carry 
his  point,  and  he  was  indifferent  to  the 
censure  of  the  few  really  great  journals  and 
the  small  —  and  unpurchasable  —  week 
ly.  He  would  like  to  have  that  weekly, 
but  when  he  found  it  impossible  to  buy  it, 
or  silence  it,  he  suffered  it  to  bark  away  — 
it  didn't  matter  in  the  long  run,  said  the 
cynical  boss  —  and  he  was  right. 

So  Chalden  had  power,  such  power  as 
all  the  Whyots,  dead  and  gone  from  the 
Major  back  to  Adam,  put  together,  if  they 

[15] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

could  trace  so  far,  had  never  enjoyed.  I 
said  the  Major  back  to  Adam  advisedly, 
because  it  was  inconceivable  that  the  earth 
could  ever  have  moved  along  without  a 
Whyot  to  assist  Providence  in  keeping 
things  going;  and  the  genealogical  tree, 
which  was  the  Major's  fondest  study,  went 
back  into  pre-historic  times  with  various 
wonderful  authentications  of  its  accuracy, 
not  the  least  of  which  was  the  Major  him 
self. 

And  then  Philip  Chalden  not  only  had 
power  politically,  municipal  power  and 
therefore  national  power,  but  he  had  money 
besides.  Indeed,  in  modern  politics  these 
two  things  seem  to  depend  upon  each  other. 
He  was  director  of  heaven  —  or  perhaps 
it  would  be  better  to  say  the  other  place  — 
only  knew  how  many  corporations,  and 
when  Philip  Chalden  took  his  place  on  a 
Board  of  Directors,  he  usually  became  the 
whole  Board.  It  was  very  simple.  The 
function  of  a  director  is  to  direct.  He  di 
rected.  What  his  fellow  directors  thought 
[16] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

or  wished  did  not  matter  —  at  least  not  to 
Chalden.  He  owned  the  trolley  system, 
the  biggest  shipyards  on  the  Delaware, 
the  greatest  locomotive  works;  he  was 
president  of  the  largest  bank,  in  fact 
men  said  if  you  investigated  any  sort  of 
an  enterprise  —  successful,  that  is  —  you 
would  generally  run  up  against  Philip  Chal 
den  before  you  got  through.  If  the  poor 
little  Major  had  but  known  it,  he  enjoyed 
the  income  of  his  million  of  invested  doll 
ars  simply  because  Chalden  disdained  such 
game  as  he  and  did  not  bother  with  little 
things.  The  arrogance  of  that  little  sec 
tion  of  Philadelphia  for  which  the  Major 
stood  amused  him,  when  he  thought  of  it, 
and  he  tolerated  it,  let  it  alone  —  it  did 
not  matter ! 

In  addition  to  his  political  and  financial 
power  Philip  Chalden  had  birth  and  breed 
ing  and  education  as  well.  Here  was  no 
vulgar  boss.  Although  no  one  knew  it,  he 
was  born  of  one  of  the  oldest  and  proudest 
families  of  St.  Louis.  While  the  Major 

[17] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

and  his  friends  had  been  exploiting  them 
selves  in  Philadelphia  Philip  Chalden's  an 
cestors  had  been  playing  great  parts  in  the 
history  of  the  nation.  For  reasons  which 
were  sufficient  to  him  —  and  therefore  no 
body's  business,  he  fondly  fancied  —  Chal- 
den  had  chosen  in  early  life  to  abandon  his 
family  name  and  to  forsake  the  United 
States.  That  appellation  under  which  he 
was  now  known  had  nothing  to  do  with  his 
birth,  although  it  was  in  some  sort  a  fam 
ily  inheritance.  He  had  quietly  appeared 
in  Philadelphia  a  score  of  years  ago,  com 
ing  from  Italy,  it  was  believed,  or  some 
other  foreign  land,  without  explanation, 
and  had  gone  to  work.  He  was  a  mystery 
in  the  beginning  and  had  remained  so, 
though  there  were  many  who  would  have 
given  fortunes  to  penetrate  the  mystery 
and  solve  the  secret  men  instinctively  felt 
was  locked  in  his  own  breast. 

Chalden  was  an  uncommunicative  man 
who  never  told  anybody  anything.    He  let 
results  speak  for  him,  and  they  spoke  in  no 
[18] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

uncertain  tones.  His  manners  were  polite 
enough,  but  hard  and  masterful.  He  had 
been  brutalized  by  unlimited  success,  mor 
ally,  that  is,  just  as  the  Major's  forebears 
had  been  weakened  by  it  —  the  difference 
was  temperamental.  The  Major  scorned 
humanity,  and  holding  himself  aloof  from 
it  let  it  alone.  Chalden  hated  it,  mastered 
it,  ruined  it,  flung  it  away,  gasping,  crushed 
and  broken.  The  Major  would  scorn  to 
do  a  mean  thing,  though  the  petty  was  his 
frequent  path ;  the  financier  would  not  stoop 
to  do  a  petty  thing,  though  he  allowed  no 
scruple  to  stop  him  in  a  grand  coup. 

Chalden  had  already  been  offered  a  cab 
inet  position;  had  he  been  willing  to  clear 
up  the  doubt  about  his  nationality,  he 
might  have  had  the  nomination  for  Presi 
dent  of  the  United  States  —  a  thing  the 
Major  would  not  have  accepted  under  any 
circumstances.  The  Major  was  like  the 
de  Rohans  —  a  king  he  could  not  be, 
there  was  nothing  else  to  tempt  him.  He 
was  a  Whyot.  The  Major  and  Chal- 
[19] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

den  were  an  admirable  pair  to  contemplate. 
Both  were  thoroughly  American  products. 
There  are  many  Majors  —  in  Philadelphia 
• —  and  not  a  few  Chaldens  there  and 
everywhere. 

Chalden  had  been  a  college  man  and 
in  youth  had  mingled  in  the  best  society 
in  the  United  States.  Now  he  mingled  in 
no  society  at  all.  He  lived  alone  in  his 
big  house  on  North  Broad  Street,  and  few 
there  were  who  entered  it.  He  transacted 
his  business  in  the  Chalden  building,  near 
Fifth  and  Chestnut  streets,  and  his  whole 
private  life  was  a  thing  apart  from  public 
affairs.  There  was  no  Mrs.  Chalden. 
There  had  been  one,  but  there  was  none 
now,  and  the  family  comprised  himself 
and  his  daughter  Alicia.  It  was  Alicia 
with  whom  Dr.  William  Penn  Whyot  was 
about  to  taint  the  pure  stock  of  the  Whyots 
by  allying  himself  to  her,  in  what  the 
Major  would  have  characterized  as  unholy 
wedlock.  It  would  have  been  disgraceful 
enough  under  any  circumstances,  but  so 

[20] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

long  as  the  Major  remained  unmarried 
Dr.  William  Penn  Whyot  was  the  last  of 
his  line,  and  unless  the  old  man  married 
and  kept  up  the  stock  without  vulgar  cross, 
why  there  would  come  a  day  eventually 
when  no  adequate  representative  of  the 
ancient  family  would  be  found  to  give  that 
distinction  to  Philadelphia  which  made 
neighboring  cities  so  madly  envious  of  its 
assured  claim ! 

There  had  always  been  an  Anthony 
Phoebus  Whyot  —  so  named  from  the 
Huguenot  progenitor  —  and  a  William 
Penn  Whyot.  The  older  had  been  An 
thony  Phoebus  and  the  younger  scion  Will 
iam  Penn  right  along.  If  William  Penn 
now  married  Alicia  Chalden  it  was  con 
ceivable  that  there  might  be  a  Chalden 
Whyot,  perhaps  with  a  "  damned  hyphen 
between  'em!"  Such  a  thing  was  little 
less  than  sacrilege  in  the  Major's  mind. 

It  was  therefore  with  an  anxiety  which 
can  scarcely  be  imagined  that,  after  hear 
ing  the  direful  news  from  his  sister,  he  had 

[21] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

arranged  to  meet  his  nephew  at  the  Loyal 
Club  on  Broad  Street  and,  after  the  best 
luncheon  he  could  evolve,  reason  him  out 
of  his  infatuation. 


[22] 


II 


MAJOR  WHYOT  had  never  been 
genuinely  in  love.  It  was  a  habit 
or  an  attribute  of  the  Major's  to  be  loved 
but  to  love  not.  He  would  not  have  pro 
claimed  it,  but  he  cherished  in  his  heart 
the  conviction  that  many  women  had  been 
in  love  with  him  in  his  younger  days  and 
that  there  had  not  existed  a  maiden  who 
would  not  have  stooped  eagerly  to  lift  the 
handkerchief  if  he  had  dropped  it.  Con 
sequently,  through  his  own  lack  of  experi 
ence  in  the  consuming  fire,  Major  Whyot 
was  ignorant  of  the  fact  that  even  backed 
by  a  good  dinner  reason  stood  little  chance 
in  a  trial  of  strength  with  love.  Wrapped 
in  the  garment  of  his  own  self-esteem  he 
was  equally  unconscious  that,  contrasting 
his  own  personality  and  that  of  his  nephew, 
he  was  at  a  great  disadvantage  in  the  lat 
ter  case  as  in  the  former. 

[23] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

William  Penn  Whyot,  it  has  been  said, 
and  it  was  borne  into  the  Major's  soul 
that  afternoon  as  never  before,  did  not  re 
semble  his  ancestry  at  all.  The  Major's 
glance  comprehended  his  own  dapper, 
faultlessly  clad,  and  entirely  correct,  if 
rather  undersized,  person,  and  sighed  at 
the  difference  between  himself  and  his 
nephew.  Of  a  distinctly  Teutonic  type, 
tall,  broad-shouldered,  blond,  keen  eyed, 
redolent  of  life,  energy,  confidence,  and 
hearty  self-satisfaction,  he  was  the  Major's 
antithesis  in  almost  everything.  There 
fore  the  sigh  of  the  Major  was  one  of 
commiseration  for  William  Penn.  By  the 
way,  it  was  only  within  the  family  circle 
that  he  was  so  known.  The  girls  who  had 
loved  him  called  him  Will.  His  Philadel 
phia  intimates  affectionately  styled  him 
Billie,  or  in  bon  camaraderie,  Bill.  At  his 
college  —  Harvard  —  he  was  known  as 
"  The  Quaker,"  shortened  to  "  Quake,"  or 
"  Old  Quake,"  when  they  won  the  first 
[24] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

foot-ball  game  from  Yale  in  years  largely 
through  his  prowess. 

The  personality  of  the  younger  man 
filled  the  room  when  he  entered  it.  The 
Major  actually  seemed  to  grow  smaller  in 
his  presence.  That  is,  he  would  have 
seemed  smaller  had  there  been  any  one  be 
side  the  decorous  waiter  to  mark  the  situa 
tion.  What  he  seemed  to  do  and  what  he 
really  did  were  different,  however.  As 
William  Penn  entered  he  swelled  with  re 
sentment,  like  a  turkey  cock,  longing  for 
nothing  so  much  as  to  call  him  to  account 
then  and  there.  However,  he  restrained 
himself  for  the  present  with  what  he  con 
sidered  a  marvellous  self-control,  and  an 
swered  the  young  man's  hearty  "  Good 
afternoon,  Uncle  Anthony,"  with  what  he 
fancied  was  a  kindly,  even  an  affectionate, 
cordiality.  William  Penn  had  the  original 
Whyot  voice,  deep,  strong,  virile,  mascu 
line.  The  Major's  voice,  like  his  person 
and  his  mind,  was  also  gone  to  seed.  It 
[25] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

was  thin,  high-pitched,  and  unpleasantly 
effeminate.  It  satisfied  the  Major,  how 
ever,  and  his  nephew  had  heard  it  too 
often  to  mark  it  especially. 

Restraining  the  temptation  to  plunge  in 
medias  res  at  once,  the  Major  pointed  to 
the  table.  William  Penn  sat  down,  with 
a  word  of  explanation  that  he  had  been 
detained  by  a  professional  call,  and  the 
cocktails  were  solemnly  produced.  The 
Major's  idea  of  the  process  of  reasoning 
was  that  it  began  with  a  cocktail.  That 
singularly  fatuous  habit  was  not  an  exclu 
sive  Philadelphia  custom,  by  the  way,  and 
if  he  had  known  how  common  the  practice 
was  the  Major  might  have  abandoned  it. 
They  were  not  "  Club  Cocktails  "  either; 
no  Manhattan,  Martini,  or  other  ready- 
made  compound  for  him!  The  Major 
would  as  soon  have  thrust  his  legs  into  a 
ready-made  pair  of  trousers,  or  have  eaten 
what  he  called  a  "  bulk  olive,"  as  to  have 
poured  a  ready-made  cocktail  down  his 
aristocratic  throat.  His  at  least  were  al- 
[26] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

ways  made  to  order  after  a  recipe  time- 
honored  in  the  club — furnished  by  one  of 
his  ancestors,  by  the  way. 

"  The  thing  I  like  about  a  cocktail,"  re 
marked  the  doctor,  genially,  "  is  its  local 
color." 

"  Ye-es,"  answered  the  Major,  feeling 
after  the  intellectual  puzzle  which  this 
remark  presented,  "  er  —  it  is  warming 
inwardly  —  and  —  er  —  stimulating.  A 
pleasant  introduction  to  a  dinner." 

"  Yes,  sir,  you  are  right.  The  local 
color  is  mainly  internal,  but  it  is  quite  per 
ceptible  otherwise,  as  well." 

"  Yes,"  cackled  the  Major,  groping  for 
the  point  and  reaching  it  finally.  It  was  a 
touch  of  the  Whyot  wit,  he  thought,  and 
he  was  glad  to  recognize  it  in  William 
Penn.  "  But  sometimes  it  is  external,  too 
—  er  —  the  local  color,  if  you  have  enough 
of  it  —  the  cocktail,  I  mean  !  " 

"  Good,"    said   Doctor   William    Penn, 
gravely,  "  I  am  glad  you  caught  on,  uncle. 
That's  what  I  meant." 
[27] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

The  Major  felt  somewhat  dashed  by 
this  rebuff,  but  the  excellence  of  his  dinner 
—  and  it  was  certainly  a  good  one,  the 
Major  being  a  past  master  at  that  —  re 
assured  him,  and  it  was  with  high  hopes 
that  he  marked  course  after  course  disap 
pear.  William  Penn's  appetite  was  cer 
tainly  a  noble  one.  With  the  arrival  of 
the  coffee  and  cigars  and  the  disappearance 
of  the  waiter,  the  talk  which  the  young 
man  had  mainly  kept  up  in  the  flippant 
style  of  the  beginning,  began,  under  the 
Major's  judicious  guidance,  to  take  a  seri 
ous  turn. 

"  William  Penn  Whyot,"  said  the  Ma 
jor,  pushing  back  his  chair  after  a  grace 
ful,  well-bred,  and  somewhat  meditative 
puff  at  his  cigar  —  and  by  the  way,  the 
Major,  in  common  with  many  of  his  fellow 
citizens  in  Philadelphia,  eliminated  the 
"  h  "  when  it  followed  "  w,"  and  Why 
ot  became  "  W'yot,"  "  white  "  became 
"w'ite,"  "wheat"  "  w'eat,"  and  so  on. 
That  wasn't  the  only  peculiarity  of  his 
[28] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

accent  either.  When  he  pronounced  the 
word  "  know,"  for  instance,  he  inserted  an 
"  a  "  before  the  "  o,"  and  softened  the  re 
sulting  diphthong  until  it  was  a  cross  be 
tween  the  southern  drawl  and  the  Yankee 
twang,  with  results  strange  to  hear. 

;'  William  Penn  Whyot,"  he  continued 
solemnly  and  impressively,  "  I  have 
brought  you  here  —  ah  —  to  reason  with 
you." 

"  Go  ahead,  nunkie,"  remarked  William 
Penn  irreverently,  puffing  away  at  his  cigar 
with  characteristic  energy. 

'  William  Penn,"  said  the  old  man, 
"  you  know  that  odious  appellation  is  dis 
tinctly  unpleasant  to  me.  As  the  matter 
before  us  is  —  er  —  serious,  I  could  wish 
that  your  mood  would  be  likewise." 

"  I  beg  your  pardon,  Uncle  Anthony," 
said  the  young  man,  "  I  am  all  attention." 

"  I  learn  from  your  aunt,  sir,  that 
you  are  contemplating  —  er  —  holy  mat 
rimony." 

'  Your  information  is  quite  correct,  sir." 
[29] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  And  that  —  er  —  the  —  ah  —  young 
person " 

"  Hold  on  there  !  She  —  er  —  isn't 
what  you  call  a  '  person,'  Uncle  Anthony." 

"  We  will  pass  that  over  for  the  pres 
ent,"  said  the  older  man  solemnly.  "  Shall 
I  say  for  —  er  —  argument's  sake  —  the 
—  ah  —  object  of  your  affection?" 

"  Well,  sir,  that  is  a  truthful  descrip 
tion." 

"She  —  er  —  is,  so  I  am  informed  — 
in  —  in  — short  —  I  —  ah " 

The  Major  was  hopelessly  floundering, 
but  William  Penn  gave  him  no  possible 
assistance.  In  fact,  there  was  a  look  in 
the  blue  eyes  of  the  young  man,  a  little 
glint  which  was  sufficient  to  warn  even  so 
obtuse  and  self-centred  a  person  as  the 
Major  that  there  were  limits  beyond  which 
even  he  could  not  pass. 

"  The  young  lady,"  gasped  out  the  Ma 
jor  finally,  "  doesn't  appear  —  er  —  ah  — • 
to  be  one  of  us." — The  objective  case,  that 
pronoun,  of  the  ancestral  "  We  "  1 
[30] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  She  is  not,  at  least  not  yet — and  I  hope 
to  Heaven  she  never  will  be,"  the  doctor 
might  have  added  if  he  had  voiced  his  real 
thought. 

"  The  lady,  I  am  told,  is  the  daughter 
of  —  of  a  man  —  named  Chalden,  or 
something  of  the  sort?  " 

"  Your  information  is  quite  correct, 
sir." 

"  Mr.  Chalden  is  —  well,  in  fact,  I 
know  nothing  about  him." 

"  He  owns  half  of  Philadelphia." 

"  My  dear  William  Penn  Whyot,"  re 
marked  the  Major,  "  the  man  may  own 
four-fifths  of  it,  or  nine-tenths  of  it,  or 
ninety-nine  hundredths  of  it.  I  know  very 
little  of  that  portion  of  Philadelphia,  and 
I  want  to  know  less.  Who  owns  such 
people  is  a  matter  of  indifference  to  me, 
as  I  suppose  it  is  largely  to  them.  I 
suppose  we  are  obliged  to  have  the  lower 
classes " 

"  Or  the  interest  on  your  bonds  would 
not  be  paid,  Uncle  Anthony." 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  Quite  so,  and  having  paid  the  interest 
they  cease  to  interest  me  further,"  said 
Uncle  Anthony,  serenely,  waving  his  hand 
as  if  to  dismiss  a  topic  which  was  of  no 
especial  importance.  "  But  this  man  —  er 

—  Chalden,  is  it  not?  —  doesn't  own  me." 
"  He  might  if  he  wanted  to,"  thought 

the  doctor. 

"  And  the  people  of  Philadelphia,  at 
least  among  those  with  whom  I  mingle, 
do  not  know  him.  Now,  my  dear  William 
Penn  Whyot,  a  moment's  reflection  will,  I 
am  sure,  convince  you  of  the  manifest  im 
propriety  of  allying  your  blood  with  —  er 
-that  of  Mr.  Chalden.  The  Whyots 
for  generations  have  married  none  but  the 
best  people  in  Philadelphia,  and  as  you  are 
the  last  of  the  line  —  I  shall  never  marry 

—  there  is  a  burden  laid  upon  you  by  your 
ancestors,  the  obligation  of  your  race,  sir. 
Honor  demands   that  you   should  be   ex 
ceedingly  careful  in  your  choice   of  a  — 
er " 

"  Honor  demands,  Uncle  Anthony,  that 
[32] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

I  should  marry  to  please  myself,  not  my 
ancestors.  But  I  have  been  careful.  She 
is  perfect,  sir;  and  to  be  quite  frank  with 
you,  I  don't  care  a  rap  for  all  the  Whyots 
dead  and  gone  as  compared  to  Al  —  Miss 
Chalden." 

"My  dear  William  Penn !  "  remon 
strated  the  Major  sadly,  outraged  by  such 
irreverence,  "  you  must  be  —  er  —  in 
love." 

"  Well,  Uncle,  aren't  most  people  who 
4  contemplate  matrimony  '  in  love?  " 

"  People  of  the  vulgar  sort,  I  believe, 
are  prone  to  —  er  —  the  passion.  Now, 
I  —  ah  —  contemplated  matrimony  sev 
eral  times  in  my  early  career,  but  never 
with  such  feelings  as  those  which  seem  to 
actuate  you." 

"  Perhaps  that's  why  you  never  mar 
ried?" 

"  No,  no.  To  tell  the  truth,  there  were 
no  particularly  attractive  girls  in  our  circle 
at  the  time,  and  rather  than  marry  outside 
of  it  I  concluded  to  remain  a  bachelor.  It 

[33] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

was  a  great  sacrifice,  but  I  depended  on 
you  to  —  ah  —  carry  on  the  line." 

''  Well,  uncle,  I'm  sorry  I  can't  please 
you,  but  I'm  not  built  that  way." 

"  Conditions  are  different  now,  William 
Penn,"  urged  the  other;  "  there  are,  I  have 
noticed,  a  number  of  young  women  of  our 
acquaintance,  who  would  be  eminently 
suited  to  you,  who  are  possessed  of  the 
necessary  birth,  some  little  means,  although 
you  will  lack  for  nothing  when  I  die,  and 
charms  of  person  —  er  —  sufficient  to 
make  the  union  I  propose  not  distasteful. 
There  are  Miss " 

"  Hold  on,  Uncle  Anthony,  don't  men 
tion  the  young  ladies'  names.  I  should  not 
like  to  refuse  them  even  to  you,  and  it 
would  be  no  use  anyway,  as  I  am  in  love 
with  Miss  Chalden  and  I  intend  to  marry 
her." 

"  It's  that  damned  Harvard  College 
that  has  done  this,"  the  Major  burst  out 
wrathfully,  his  quivering  self-control  utter 
ly  gone,  and  the  combination  between  his 
[34] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

feeble  voice,  his  flushed  face,  and  the  in 
tensity  of  his  language  almost  moved  the 
doctor  to  laughter.  "  If  you  hadn't  gone 
there  you  would  never  have  escaped  from 
the  influence  of  Philadelphia.  I  wanted 
you  to  follow  in  the  footsteps  of  your 
fathers  at  the  old  University,  but  you 
would  go  to  that  accursed  Boston,  where 
what  they  call  brains  takes  precedence  over 
everything  a  gentleman  holds  dear.  It  is 
either  that  or  your  grandmother.  One 
mesalliance  in  the  family  breeds  another. 
My  great-grandfather  almost  broke  his 
heart  when  your  grandfather  married  a 
Putbus  of  Germantown,  and  damn  it  all, 
sir,  you  look  like  her!  You're  not  a  bit  of 
a  Whyot  in  anything.  We  did  the  best  we 
could  for  you  before  you  were  born  by 
marrying  your  father  to  my  poor  sister. 
She  was  a  Whyot  of  the  purest  blood,  his 
cousin,  and  I  thought  we  could  break  up 
the  infernal  cross.  And  when  she  died 
your  aunt,  my  sister,  did  her  best  to  instill 
proper  principles  in  you.  But  I  see  we 

[35] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

didn't  succeed,  sir.  Who  are  these  Chal- 
den  people,  anyhow?" 

The  Major  was  fluent  enough  when  he 
was  excited  as  now.  William  Penn  was 
sorely  angered  but  at  the  same  time  amused 
by  his  uncle's  language.  He  had  never 
enjoyed  the  pleasure  of  seeing  his  grand 
mother,  the  "  Putbus  of  Germantown," 
and  he  did  not  feel  inclined  to  take  up  any 
vigorous  cudgels  in  her  behalf,  yet  it  did 
not  seem  quite  gallant  of  him  to  allow  the 
unoffending  old  lady  to  be  reviled  without 
making  some  defence  for  her.  However, 
he  realized  what  a  shock  his  approaching 
marriage  would  be  to  his  uncle,  and,  as  he 
was  genuinely  fond  of  the  queer  little  old 
man,  he  controlled  himself  as  best  he  could 
and  answered  him  gently. 

"  Well,  uncle,  to  be  frank  with  you,  I 
know  very  little  about  the  Chalden  family. 
They  came  here  some  years  ago  from  Italy 
or  some  foreign  land,  yet  they  are  Ameri 
cans.  Miss  Chalden  told  me  that  her 
father  never  talks  about  it,  but  she  believes 
[36] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

they  originally  sprang  from  St.  Louis  — 
that  is  not  generally  known,  and  you  will 
kindly  not  mention  it,  sir?  " 

"From  St.  Louis?"  interrupted  the 
Major  fiercely.  "St.  Louis?  Where  in 
Heaven's  name  is  the  place?  " 

"  In  Missouri,  sir." 

"  Good  God,  sir,  you  don't  mean  the 
West? "  in  a  tone  which  the  Pharisees 
might  have  used  when  they  asked  if  any 
thing  good  could  have  come  out  of  Naza 
reth. 

"  I  do,  sir.  If  you  will  recall  it,  sir, 
St.  Louis  is  as  old  as  Philadelphia.  I  think 
it  was  settled  before  Philadelphia,  if  I  am 
not  mistaken,  and  I  have  no  doubt  these 
people  are  just  as  good  as " 

"  William  Penn,"  cried  the  Major 
fiercely,  "  stop  there !  You  don't  know 
what  you  are  saying!  You  will  thank  me 
in  your  cooler  moments.  Preserve  your 
temper.  Look  at  me,  sir!  " 

The  little  man  was  fairly  trembling  with 
excitement  and  emotion. 
[37] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

"  Well,"  said  William  Penn,  smiling  in 
spite  of  himself,  "  whatever  her  family 
may  be,  I  am  going  to  marry  her,  not  her 
ancestors.  She  is " 

"  Spare  me,"  sneered  the  Major  scorn 
fully,  "  I  am  in  no  mood  to  listen  to  the 
rhapsodies  of  a  lover.  What's  her 
name?" 

"  Alicia." 

"  Alicia !  "  snorted  the  old  man,  "  what 
sort  of  a  damned  fancy  name  is  that? 
If  you  will  marry  the  woman,  why 
couldn't  she  have  a  name  like  Maria,  or 

—  er  —  Elizabeth,    or    Sophia,    like  —  er 

—  the  females  of  our  house.     By  gad,  sir 

—  Alicia  !      It   sounds  —  er  —  foreign  — 
and  —  er  —  I  don't  like  it !  " 

"  '  There  was  no  thought  of  pleasing 
you  when  she  was  christened,'  sir,"  dryly 
answered  the  doctor,  flinging  in  the  quota 
tion  deftly,  the  opening  for  it  was  so  good. 

"  I  suppose  not,  sir,  and  yet  they  might 
have  done  worse  things  than  attempting  to 
pleasure  the  Whyots  in  the  naming  of  any 
[38] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

child,"  put  in  the  old  Major  with  uncon 
scious  humor. 

"  Of  course,  of  course,"  answered  his 
nephew;  "but,  seriously,  uncle,  Miss 
Alicia  Chalden  is  a  woman  endowed  with 
every  grace  of  mind  and  person.  She  is  a 
graduate  of  Brookford  College,  a  Doctor 
of  Philosophy  of  that  famous  institution, 
and  a  woman  any  man  might  be  proud  to 
wed.  It  is  no  mesalliance,  as  you  have 
said,  and  that  I  have  won  her  affection 
amazes  and  surprises  as  much  as  it  de 
lights  me." 

"  But  her  family,  her  family,  sir?  " 

"  When  you  see  Mr.  Chalden  you  will 
be  ready  to  consider  him  the  Rudolph  of 
Hapsburg  of  his  family,  I  am  sure." 

"  But,  my  dear  William  Penn  —  St. 
Louis !  It's  quite  impossible,  I  assure  you. 
Where  do  they  come  from?  Who  are 
they?  What  patents  of  nobility  are  back 
of  them?" 

"  As  to  that,  I  don't  know,  and  I  care 
less." 

[39] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  And  that  man  Chalden,  he  lives  north 
of  Market  Street,  on  North  Broad,  actu 
ally  "  —  the  Major  fairly  gasped  as  he 
enunciated  this  direful  fact,  which  cer 
tainly  could  not  fail  to  disgust  any  rational 
being.  "  Think  of  it !  You  don't  want 
to  get  involved  with  any  of  those  north 
of  Market  Street  people,  William  Penn. 
Why,  he  is  mixed  up  with  all  sorts  of 
vulgar  business  —  er  —  trade,  and  all 
that!" 

"  Yes,  I  believe  he  is,"  answered  the 
doctor  composedly;  "  perhaps  his  original 
ancestor  may  have  been  a  shoemaker,  or 
—  possibly  a  barber." 

"  William  Penn !  "  said  the  Major, 
wincing  under  this  bald  and  brutal  thrust, 
"  I  fear  you  are  hopeless.  It's  that  cursed 
Putbus  blood." 

"  Pshaw,  Uncle  Anthony,  he  has  a  great 
many  irons  in  the  fire,  I  suppose,  but  what 
of  it?  For  that  matter,  they  say  he  owns 
most  of  Philadelphia.  I  am  sure  I  don't 
know,  but  I  understand  that  he  is  a  director 
[40] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

in  about  everything  that  is  worth  directing, 
and  if  the  papers  are  true  he  is  the  political 
boss  of  the  town.  But  I  am  not  marrying 
Alicia  for  her  family,  or  her  father's 
money,  but  because  I  —  love  her." 

"  William  Penn,"  said  the  Major,  nerv 
ing  himself  for  the  final  plunge,  "  as  —  the 
—  er  —  head  of  the  Whyot  family,  I  say 
my  last  word  on  the  subject  to  you.  I  for 
bid  this  marriage.  Should  it  take  place  I 
will  revoke  the  will  I  have  made  in  which 
you  are  my  sole  legatee,  and  devise  my 
fortune  elsewhere." 

"  My  dear  uncle,"  said  the  doctor,  ris 
ing  and  taking  the  limp,  unresisting  hand 
of  his  uncle  in  his  own  strong  one,  "  to 
lose  your  friendship  and  affection  would 
be  a  great  blow  to  me.  I  will  not  say  that 
I  would  be  indifferent  to  the  loss  of  your 
fortune,  though  I  hope  in  any  event  the 
day  when  I  shall  enjoy  it  may  long  be 
deferred " 

'  You  shall  never  enjoy  it  unless  you 
abandon  this  monstrous  marriage  you  are 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 


about  to  —  er  —  perpetrate,"  interrupted 
the  old  man. 

"  But  should  you  will  your  property 
elsewhere  my  chief  regret  would  be  be 
cause  that  was  a  mark  of  your  displeasure. 
I  will  be  frank  with  you.  It  may  be  the 
Putbus  plainness,  or  the  Whyot  honesty 
—  the  Whyots  were  always  men  of  honor. 
Alicia  Chalden  is  worth  a  million  fortunes 
like  yours  and  that  of  her  father  com 
bined,  and  I  shall  never  give  her  up  under 
any  circumstances  so  long  as  she  honors 
me  with  her  affection.  Don't  do  anything 
in  a  hurry,  Uncle  Anthony.  Wait  until  I 
have  the  pleasure  of  presenting  her  to  you. 
Good-by,  sir,"  and  before  the  dazed  Ma 
jor  could  gather  his  wits  together  and  re 
cover  from  the  shock  which  the  bold  but 
kindly  tempered  young  man  had  inflicted 
upon  him,  Doctor  William  Penn  Whyot 
had  vanished  from  the  room. 

The  Major  sat  and  rubbed  his  head  with 
his  hand  meditatively  for  a  moment,  until 
finally  through  the  wreck  of  his  plans 
[42] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

arose  the  glimmerings  of  an  idea.  He 
looked  at  his  watch.  It  was  seven  o'clock. 
They  had  dined  early  on  account  of  some 
previous  engagements.  The  man  would 
not  be  at  his  office  at  that  hour.  He  would 
be  at  his  home.  Pressing  a  button,  the 
Major  ordered  his  carriage.  He  had 
taken  a  desperate  resolution.  He  would 
go  to  see  Philip  Chalden  in  person  about 
this  iniquitous  marriage,  which  must  be 
stopped  at  all  hazards. 


[43] 


Ill 


TIME  was  when  all  coachmen  were 
negroes.  The  Major's  rule  of  life 
was  contained  in  the  military  phrase,  "  As 
you  were  1  "  He  followed  the  ancient 
practice  long  after  others  had  bowed  to 
the  modern  innovation,  and  a  few  families 
to  whom  the  habits  of  the  Whyots  were 
oracular  did  likewise.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
however,  the  Major's  black  coachman  and 
footman  were  unique  even  in  Philadelphia, 
where  the  thing  that  has  been  is  the  thing 
that  shall  be  until  the  end  of  the  chapter. 
All  the  Major's  servants  were  negroes, 
therefore,  and  he  took  pride  and  pleasure 
in  the  fact. 

The  distance  between  the  Loyal  Club 
and  the  big  new  granite  house  on  North 
Broad  Street  was  soon  compassed,  and  al 
most  before  he  had  developed  his  cam 
paign,  or  even  outlined  his  plan  of  attack, 
[44] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

he  found  himself  in  the  drawing-room 
waiting  the  master.  As  he  sat  there  he 
inspected  the  room  quickly,  curiously,  and 
somewhat  contemptuously.  It  was  in  per 
fect  taste.  That  could  not  be  gainsaid. 
The  pictures  on  the  walls,  the  bric-a-brac 
on  the  magnificent  mantel,  the  furniture, 
the  carpets,  the  decorations,  all  were  of 
the  rarest  and  most  beautiful  variety,  but 
they  were  new.  The  Major  was  the  old 
est  thing  in  that  room,  and  in  spite  of  the 
fact  that  he  did  dress  in  the  latest  fashion, 
he  looked  as  old  as  his  ancestry.  The 
Major  was  surprised,  he  did  not  know 
that  such  things  existed  —  north  of  Mar 
ket  Street!  To  him  entered  Philip  Chal- 
den. 

The  millionaire  was  of  the  physical  ap 
pearance  which  naturally  accords  with  the 
title.  He  was  a  large,  stout,  powerfully 
built,  full-bearded  man,  with  a  keen,  pierc 
ing  eye,  firm,  straight  lips  and  resolute 
jaw.  His  once  black  hair  and  full  beard 
were  lightened  with  gray.  He  was  con- 
[45] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

siderably  past  middle  age,  though  some 
what  younger  than  the  Major.  The  Ma 
jor  was  never  impressed  by  anyone  but 
himself,  but  to  ordinary  mortals  there  was 
something  oppressive  in  the  presence  of 
this  man.  He  absorbed  power  from  his 
environment  with  such  directness  that  a 
sensation  of  weakness  was  produced  among 
those  who  approached  him.  Feeble  men 
gave  up  at  once  and  submitted  to  his  dom 
ination,  stronger  men  struggled  against  it, 
often  unavailingly.  In  many  instances  his 
personality  excited  admiration  and  devo 
tion.  Sometimes,  but  more  rarely,  it 
awakened  antagonisms,  furious,  intense, 
persistent.  Few  people  could  be  indiffer 
ent  to  it.  It  was  only  egregious  and  co 
lossal  self-satisfaction,  such  as  the  Major 
possessed,  upon  which  it  had  no  perceptible 
effect  one  way  or  the  other. 

The   man   was  cold,    reserved,    distant, 

dignified,  repellent,  to  the  last  degree,  yet 

his  manner  was  admirable.     Truth  to  tell, 

his  satisfaction  with  himself  was  probably 

[46] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

as  great  as  that  of  the  Major  with  him 
self,  yet  there  was  this  further  difference 
between  the  two,  one  had  much  reason  to 
be  satisfied,  the  other  had  little.  Yet, 
after  all,  reason  has  no  more  to  do  with 
self-satisfaction  than  it  has  to  do  with  love, 
and  love  is  only  self-satisfaction  extended 
to  embrace  somebody  else. 

"  Major  Whyot,"  said  Mr.  Chalden, 
looking  up  from  the  card  in  his  hand  as 
the  Major  rose  on  his  entrance. 

"  The  same,  sir." 

"  Be  seated,  sir.  You  are  of  Philadel 
phia,  I  presume?  " 

'Why,  of  course,  sir!  I  am  surprised 
that  -  '  gasped  out  the  Major  in  aston 
ishment. 

The  natural  way  to  put  the  question 
according  to  the  Major  was  to  say  that 
Philadelphia  was  of  him,  since  the  greater 
contains  the  less,  and  he  was  petrified  at 
the  idea  that  Mr.  Chalden  did  not  know 
who  he  was. 

"  Of  course !     I  am  surprised  that  you 
[47] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

ask  such  a  question,  sir!  "  he  exploded 
wrath  fully.  "  I  have  been  here  for  two 
hundred  years  at  least,  sir!  " 

As  usual,  the  little  Major  was  confus 
ing  himself  with  his  ancestry. 

"  Ah,  indeed,"  said  Mr.  Chalden,  the 
faintest  flicker  of  a  smile  beneath  his  heavy 
mustache ;  "  I  did  not  know  "  —  which  was 
not  exactly  an  accurate  statement.  '  You 
wish  to  see  me?  " 

'  Yes,  sir.  I  come  in  behalf  of  my 
nephew,  Doctor  William  Penn  Whyot." 

"  I  see." 

"  I  wish  to  speak  to  you  about  this  — 
er  —  marriage  with  your  —  ah  —  daugh 
ter,  sir." 

u  And  does  your  nephew  wish  you  to 
plead  his  cause,  sir?  " 

"  God  bless  me,  sir,  certainly  not!  " 

"  I  am  rejoiced  to  hear  it,  Major  Why 
ot,  for  the  little  I  have  seen  of  that  young 
man  has  convinced  me  that  he  is  abundantly 
able  to  plead  his  own  cause." 

"  You  are  quite  right,"  answered  the 
[48] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

Major,  "  in  fact  I  think  he  is  a  little  too 
able.  His  assurance " 

"  My  dear  sir,  you  cannot  succeed  now 
adays  without  assurance.  It  is  assurance 
that  wins  modern  battles.  I  half  believe 
it  won  them  in  the  past." 

"  Yes,"  said  the  Major  vaguely,  utterly 
ignorant  that  he  was  a  living  example  of 
the  worst  kind  of  assurance,  that  which  has 
no  basis  or  reason  for  being,  "  but  I  —  er 
—  this  approaching  marriage " 

"  Well,  sir,  to  be  frank,  I  have  not  yet 
decided  whether  I  shall  consent  to  the  mar 
riage  or  not." 

"  God  bless  my  soul,  sir !  "  spluttered 
the  Major,  "  do  you  mean  to  tell  me  that 
you  can  hesitate  for  a  single  moment  at 
the  opportunity  opened  by  —  er — the  en 
thusiasm  of  a  misguided  youth,  for  allying 
yourself,  your  family  —  ah  —  with  the 
Whyots,  sir!  Why,  sir,  a  marriage  with 
a  Whyot  is  putting  the  hall  mark  of  re 
spectability  —  the  —  er  —  upon " 

The  Major  pulled  himself  up  just  in 
[49] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

time.  There  was  a  tightening  of  Mr. 
Chalden's  gloomy  brow,  a  little  brighter 
flash  from  his  steel-gray  eye,  that  flung  a 
danger  signal  across  the  Major's  path. 
He  wasn't  afraid  of  anybody,  this  little 
Major,  but  he  was  a  gentleman  accord 
ing  to  his  lights,  and  he  would  not  charge 
his  message  with  any  unnecessary  rudeness. 
He  had  said  enough,  anyway. 

"Well,  Major,"  said  Mr.  Chalden 
gravely,  as  the  little  gentleman's  speech 
went  up  into  the  air,  "  you  are  an  able 
and  eloquent  advocate.  I  confess  that  I 
had  not  looked  at  the  matter  in  that  light, 
but  since  you  make  such  a  point  of  it,  and 
since  it  is  in  evidence  from  the  zeal  with 
which  you  plead  the  young  man's  cause 
that  your  consent  and  approbation  will  not 
be  withheld  in  case  the  marriage  be  ar 
ranged,  I  shall  be  apt  to  think  favorably 
of  your  nephew's  plea." 

'  You  entirely  misunderstand  me,  sir," 
gasped  the  Major  impetuously,  "  I  do  not 
wish  it  at  all." 

[50] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


"  But  you  said  the  honor  of  an  alliance 
with  a  Whyot— 

'  Yes,  sir,  and  it  would  be  an  honor, 
but  it  is  much  too  great  an  honor  for  an 
unknown  daughter  of  an  unknown  man, 
sir." 

Chalden  kept  his  temper  admirably. 
That  was  one  source  of  his  power.  Like 
William  the  Silent  he  was  tranquil  in  the 
midst  of  storms.  It  is  true,  he  usually 
raised  the  storms  himself  and  the  tranquil 
lity  was  easier  on  that  account,  but  to  the 
big,  powerful  man  the  wrathful,  squeaky 
little  Major,  with  his  ancestry,  his  arro 
gance,  and  his  pride,  was  an  object  rather 
of  pity  and  contempt  than  antagonism. 

"  Frankly,  sir,"  answered  the  great 
financier,  "  I  fancy  I  am  sufficiently  well 
known  in  this  community.  My  name  —  I 
speak  in  strict  confidence  as  one  gentleman 

o 

to  another,  sir  " — the  little  Major  bowed 
coldly  at  this,  and  Chalden  knew  that  he 
was  to  be  trusted,  too  —  "  is  one  which  I 
have  made  myself.  I  will  say  to  you  what 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

I  have  said  to  no  other  man,  that  I  have  a 
legal  right  to  bear  another  name,  a  legal 
and  moral  right,  sir.  I  was  born  an  Avery 
of  St.  Louis.  You  will  respect  my  confi 
dence,  I  am  sure?  " 

The  Major  bowed  again — really,  from 
some  points  of  view,  Mr.  Chalden  was  not 
so  bad  after  all ! 

"  My  family  there,  I  take  it,  though  it 
is  a  matter  of  supreme  indifference  to  me 
personally,  is  as  old  as  your  own,"  con 
tinued  Chalden,  who  divined  that  by  plac 
ing  the  matter  on  the  little  Major's  honor 
he  was  perfectly  safe  in  revealing  what  he 
had  confided  to  no  one  else  —  not  even  his 
daughter.  "  My  original  ancestor  was  a 
fur  trader.  What  was  yours,  sir?  " 

"  A  shoe  —  it  is  of  no  consequence  at 
all,  sir,"  answered  the  Major  in  some  con 
fusion.  "  Pray  proceed,  Mr.  Ch  — 
Avery." 

"  Excuse  me,  Major  Whyot.  I  have 
assumed  the  name  of  Chalden  for  reasons 
which  are  good  and  sufficient  to  me,  and 
[52] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

I  desire  to  be  addressed  by  it,  and  not  by 
the  name  of  Avery.  I  repeat,  that  this  is 
told  to  you  in  strict  confidence,  which  the 
proposed  relationship  between  our  families 
warrants." 

"  And  your  reasons,  sir?  " 

"  Concern  no  one  but  myself,  sir.  As 
you  know,  I  am  a  man  of  fortune." 

"  I  know  nothing  about  it,  sir,"  said  the 
Major;  "  my  observations  of  life  and  so 
ciety  are  confined  to  my  own  associates." 

"  The  facts  are  as  I  have  stated  them." 

"  It  may  be,"  responded  the  other;  "  of 
course  you  understand  that  money  or  the 
lack  of  it  has  nothing  to  do  with  my  — 
er — opposition  to  the  marriage." 

"  Certainly  it  has  not  in  my  case,"  an 
swered  Chalden  coolly,  "  else  I  would  look 
for  a  higher  alliance  even  than  one  with 
the  heir  of  your  ancient  lineage,  and  what 
ever  other  possessions  you  may  have. 
However,  my  daughter  has  chosen  to  fall 
in  love  with  your  nephew.  So  at  least  she 
has  confided  to  me.  The  circumstances  of 
[53] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

their  meeting  were  somewhat  romantic. 
Doctor  Whyot  has  approached  me  in  a 
manly  and  dignified  manner  and  asked  my 
consent  to  a  marriage.  I  am  favorably 
impressed  with  him,  but  I  have  taken  the 
matter  under  advisement,  and  will  decide 
the  matter  when  I  have  made  certain  in 
vestigations  concerning  his  character  and 
ability.  Should  I  find  Doctor  Whyot  de 
serving,  as  I  trust  he  may  be,  I  shall  prob 
ably  give  my  consent." 

The  man  was  magnificent  in  his  cool 
assumption  of  superiority,  and  the  Major 
was  fast  losing  all  control  of  himself.  The 
idea  of  his  taking  that  ground  with  any 
one  who  bore  the  Whyot  name.  It  was 
infamous ! 

"  But,  good  heavens,  sir !  "  he  burst  out, 
"  do  you  not  see  the  manifest  impropriety 
of  such  a  marriage?  " 

"  What  is  the  impropriety,  sir?  " 

"  Why,  you  are  not  —  er  —  your  daugh 
ter  doesn't  —  er  —  in  short,  sir,  you  do 
not  belong  to  the  people  —  you  know  — 
[54] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

the  —  ah  —  the  society  in  which  I  mingle. 
My  ancestors  have  had  a  pew  in  St.  Chris 
topher's  church  since  the  church  was  built, 
sir,  and  we  have  lived  in  the  same  house 
on  Pine  Street  for  one  hundred  and  fifty 
years !  Why,  sir,  I  was  born  in  the  same 
bed  my  great-great-great-great-grandfather 
was  born  in !  We  are  the  oldest,  the 
purest  blooded  people  in  the  United  States, 
sir,  and  you  wish  me  to  consent  to  a  mar 
riage  between  your  daughter  and  my  neph 
ew  !  The  daughter  of  a  man  who,  for 
reasons  known  only  to  himself,  passes  un 
der  a  name  not  his  own!  And  to  my 
nephew,  the  last  of  his  line,  sir!  " 

"  Let  me  hear  no  more  in  this  strain, 
sir !  "  said  Chalden  peremptorily  and  with 
emphasis.  "  I  beg  to  point  out  to  you  that 
I  am  neither  asking  nor  expecting  your 
consent.  I  do  not  care  a  snap  of  my  fin 
ger  for  your  consent  to  the  marriage  of 
my  daughter  and  your  nephew.  My 
daughter  shall  marry  whom  she  pleases, 
provided  I  please.  Your  claims  to  social 
[55] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

distinction  are  absolutely  nothing  to  me. 
I  care  nothing  for  society,  except  to  despise 
it.  So  far  as  your  family  is  concerned,  I 
may  tell  you  frankly  that  if  I  saw  in  your 
nephew  the  least  resemblance  to  the  ances 
tral  traits  you  exhibit,  I  should  instantly, 
without  hesitation,  deny  his  suit  and  for 
bid  any  further  intercourse  between  my 
daughter  and  himself." 

"  But,  sir  — "  shouted  the  Major,  at 
least  he  came  as  near  shouting  as  his  vocal 
apparatus  permitted. 

"  Excuse  me  further,"  interrupted  Chal- 
den,  "  you  have  come  to  my  house  unin 
vited,  and  you  have  made  yourself  unwel 
come.  I  have  borne  with  your  slurs  and 
insults  longer  than  I  am  accustomed  to 
bear.  In  fact,  no  one  ever  before  presumed 
in  such  a  manner.  My  patience  is  ended. 
My  family  is  as  good  as  yours.  My 
manners,  this  interview  has  proved,  are  in 
finitely  better  than  yours.  You  are  a  living 
example  of  that  arrogance  and  ignorance 
which  are  characteristics  of  that  deluded 
[56] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

set  which  claims  to  represent  all  that  is  best 
in  Philadelphia,  in  the  United  States,  in 
the  world  itself,  for  that  matter.  I  have 
marked  you  and  your  confreres  in  secret 
amusement  heretofore.  You  have  not 
been  worth  serious  attention,  but,  sir,  if  I 
hear  any  more  from  you,  or  your  friends, 
I  will  break  you  to  pieces!  I  will  submit 
to  no  more  insults,  to  no  more  sneers,  to  no 
more  innuendoes  from  you.  I  will  marry 
my  daughter  to  your  nephew  or  not,  just 
as  I  please,  and  if  you  value  your  house  on 
Pine  Street,  or  your  pew  in  St.  Christo 
pher's,  in  God's  name,  sir,  go  back  to  the 
one  or  to  the  other  and  keep  quiet.  Learn 
for  the  first  time  in  your  life  the  truth,  un 
welcome  though  it  will  doubtless  be,  that 
you  live  here  and  enjoy  your  petty  position 
on  sufferance,  my  sufferance.  I  hold  Phila 
delphia,  and  you,  and  all  of  you,  in  the 
hollow  of  my  hand.  If  my  daughter 
wishes,  she  can  have  it  all.  She  is  all  I 
have.  Why,  you  poor  little  relic  of  the 
past,  if  she  wanted  to  marry  you,  and  I 
[57] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

thought  fit  to  allow  her,  you  might  get 
down  on  your  knees  and  thank  Providence 
for  her  decision." 

"  Heaven  forbid!  "  gasped  the  Major; 
"  and  let  me  tell  you,  sir,  that  I  value  your 
threats  not  at  all.  My  birth,  breeding, 
and  position  in  society  do  not  depend  upon 
wealth  or  money,  or  a  house  on  Pine  Street, 
or  a  pew  in  St.  Christopher's.  Why,  sir, 
I  am  a  Whyot !  That  means  little  to  you, 
but  it  means  everything  to  me.  I  have 
warned  you,  sir,  that  nothing  but  unhappi- 
ness  can  come  from  such  a  mesalliance.  I 
wash  my  hands  of  it,  and  I  have  the  honor 
to  wish  you  good-evening." 

With  some  show  of  dignity  the  little 
Major  retreated  from  the  ground  where 
he  had  been  so  signally  defeated.  He  had 
tried  to  reason  with  the  lover,  also  with 
the  father,  in  both  cases  without  avail. 
There  remained  to  him  no  other  resource. 
The  lady  herself  was  out  of  the  question. 
She  would  probably  weep,  and  the  Major 
was  hopeless  before  weeping  women.  He 
[58] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

had  done  all  that  could  be  done  to  prevent 
the  marriage.  William  Penn  must  go  to 
ruin  in  his  own  way. 

Late  as  it  was  the  Major  drove  to  his 
lawyer  and  wrathfully  left  with  him  in 
structions  to  draw  up  a  new  will  in  the 
morning. 

To  understand  how  things  got  into  such 
a  dreadful  tangle,  from  the  little  Major's 
point  of  view,  it  will  be  necessary  to  turn 
back  several  months  and  then  pick  up  the 
thread. 


[59] 


IV 


«/^><IRLS,  girls,  are  you  all  here?" 

VJ"  The  anxious  voice  of  the  swiftly 
approaching  principal,  trembling  with  anx 
iety,  could  be  heard  above  the  nervous 
clamor  of  the  young  women,  the  cries  of 
the  men,  and  the  roaring  of  the  flames. 
She  was  dressed  in  an  evening  gown,  with 
a  shawl  dragging  from  one  shoulder.  As 
she  ran  up  hurriedly  she  scanned  the  group 
in  terrified  apprehension.  At  the  sight  of 
her  they  broke  into  exclamations  and  cries, 
confused  and  unintelligible. 

"Young  ladies,  be  quiet!"  she  con 
tinued,  nervously  raising  her  hand  in  her 
best  class-room  manner.  "  Remember, 
that  to  be  composed  in  the  midst  of  diffi 
culties  is  the  highest  test  of  breeding  — " 
she  could  not  refrain  from  this  act  of  in 
struction  even  in  the  excitement  attendant 
upon  the  fire,  and  indeed  she  was  the 
[60] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

coolest  person  there,  maintaining  her  self- 
control  admirably.  "  Is  anyone  missing, 
I  say?  Sarah,  Margaret,  Eloise,  Ali 
cia ?" 

There  was  no  response  as  she  called  this 
name. 

"Where  is  Alicia?"  she  added  in  a 
sharp  tone  of  voice.  "  Has  anyone  seen 
her?  You,  Janet?  " 

"  Indeed,  Miss  Winthrop,"  answered 
the  girl  thus  addressed,  "  I  don't  know 
where  she  can  be.  She  followed  me  out, 
I  thought." 

"Have  any  of  you  seen  her?"  asked 
the  principal  hurriedly.  "  Call  her." 

"Alicia!" 

"Alicia!" 

"  Alicia !  "  burst  from  the  startled  group 
of  women,  young  and  old,  in  shrill  screams, 
in  which,  as  they  afforded  a  sort  of  relief 
to  the  tension  of  the  exciting  moment,  they 
persisted  hysterically. 

There  was  no  answer  to  their  frantic 
cries. 

[61] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

"  Gracious  Heaven !  "  exclaimed  Miss 
Winthrop  at  last,  waving  for  silence  again. 
"  She  must  be  in  there." 

The  eyes  of  all  stopped  roaming  the 
field  and  were  fastened  instantly  upon 
the  burning  building,  from  every  win 
dow  of  which,  in  the  front  at  least,  the 
flames  were  pouring.  One  or  two  of 
the  girls  began  whimpering,  one  of  them 
screamed  wildly  again,  but  the  most  of 
them  stared  in  horrified  silence.  Where 
was  Alicia?  The  truth  dawned  upon  them 
at  once.  She  was  there!  Merciful 
Heaven ! 

Hulswood  Hall,  the  oldest  dormitory 
building  of  Brookford  College,  had  caught 
fire  in  one  end  at  ten  o'clock  that  night, 
and  was  now  blazing  furiously.  The 
seniors,  who  were  quartered  in  this  build 
ing,  had  barely  escaped  with  their  lives,  so 
fierce  and  sudden  had  been  the  spread  of 
the  flames  through  the  old  building.  In 
all  stages  of  deshabille  they  clustered 
around  their  principal  and  her  assistants, 
[62] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

who,  from  the  nearest  dormitories,  were 
arriving  in  swift  succession  on  the  campus  in 
front  of  the  burning  building.  The  girls 
of  the  other  classes  were  being  held  in  the 
other  dormitories,  making  preparation  for 
leaving  them  should  it  be  necessary,  which, 
on  account  of  their  isolation,  was  scarcely 
probable. 

Hulswood  Hall  was  an  ancient  Revolu 
tionary  mansion  around  which  Brookford 
College  had  arisen.  It  had  been  presented 
to  the  college  years  before  by  the  Whyot 
family  in  memory  of  a  cognate  and  allied 
family — the  Hulswoods  were  thus  dis 
tinguished  because  one  of  them  had 
married  a  Whyot.  The  college  buildings 
were  located  in  a  lovely  and  sequestered 
valley  some  distance  from  the  little  town 
of  Brookford,  which  had  grown  up  around 
the  railroad  station  of  the  same  name  not 
far  from  Philadelphia. 

There  was  no  adequate  provision  for 
fighting  such  a  fire,  and  there  was  nothing 
much  to  be  done  save  to  let  it  burn.  The 
[63] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

few  male  servants  and  other  employees  of 
the  college,  under  the  direction  of  the  pro 
fessors,  and  these  women  showed  them 
selves  cool  indeed,  were  engaged  in  wetting 
the  roofs  and  taking  other  precautions  to 
save  the  adjoining  buildings.  Hulswood 
Hall  was  doomed.  To  have  it  burned  was 
bad  enough,  but  when  the  consciousness 
burst  upon  the  now  thoroughly  alarmed 
group  of  girls  and  women  that  Alicia 
Chalden  was  missing  the  situation  became 
appalling. 

Grasping  her  dress  in  one  hand  and 
dropping  her  shawl,  Miss  Winthrop,  mo 
tioning  the  girls  to  remain  where  they 
were,  ran  toward  two  or  three  of  the  men 
who  were  busied  in  front  of  the  doorway 
of  the  hall,  removing  further  away  some 
furniture  which  had  been  brought  out  and 
piled  on  the  lawn  before  the  flames  got 
much  headway. 

"  Al  —  Miss  Chalden  is  in  there!  "  she 
screamed.  "  One  thousand  dollars,  five 
thousand,  ten  thousand,  fifty  thousand — " 
[64] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

she  knew  Mr.  Chalden's  wealth  and  affec 
tion  would  warrant  any  reward  she  might 
offer  —  "  to  any  man  who  will  go  in  the 
building  and  get  her.  That's  her  room 
over  there,"  she  cried,  pointing  to  one  of 
the  side  windows  above  the  trees. 

The  men,  led  by  the  gardener,  dashed 
at  the  doorway  instantly,  and  then  as 
promptly  recoiled  as  a  fierce  gust  of  fire 
and  smoke  burst  out  of  the  opening  and 
enveloped  them.  They  staggered  back, 
and,  after  they  had  reached  a  place  of 
comparative  safety,  gazed  anxiously  at  the 
flame-swept  house  and  shook  their  heads. 

"  It  can't  be  done,  ma'am,"  said  the 
gardener  at  last;  "  I  wouldn't  dare  to  try 
it  for  the  Chalden  millions.  A  man'd  be 
burned  to  a  crisp  before  he  got  to  her  room. 
Look  at  that  hallway,  there  are  no  stairs 
left." 

"  My  God  1  "  said  the  principal,  "  what 
shall  we  do?  What  has  happened?  She  is 
in  my  charge  —  I'll  go  myself !  " 

She  recklessly  approached  the  blazing 
[65] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

hall  with  some  half  formed  purpose  in  her 
mind,  when  the  old  gardener  drew  her 
forcibly  away  from  the  building.  She 
stood  wringing  her  hands,  her  old  face  as 
white  as  death.  The  girls  crowded  around 
her. 

"  She  was  all  right  when  we  heard  the 
alarm,"  cried  her  room-mate  piteously. 
"  I  heard  her  say  '  Run,  run!  '  when  we 
started.  I  would  not  have  left  her  if  any 
thing  had  been " 

At  this  moment  a  hatless  young  man  — 
the  inevitable  young  man  —  burst  uncere 
moniously  through  the  surrounding  girls 
and  made  for  the  principal.  He  was  tall 
and  athletic,  and  from  his  dress  it  was  evi 
dent  that  he  had  been  riding. 

"Is  anybody  in  there?"  he  asked 
sharply. 

"  Yes !  Alicia !  Miss  Chalden  I  "  came 
in  a  perfect  babel  of  screams. 

"Where  is  she?  Silence,  the  rest  of 
you !  " 

"  In  that  room  yonder." 
[66] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  The  third  from  the  front  on  the  sec 
ond  story?  " 

"  Yes.     For  God's  sake,  save  her!  " 

Without  a  word  the  young  man  started 
toward  the  building. 

"  Fifty  thousand  dollars  — "  screamed 
Miss  Winthrop  after  him,  but  she  had  not 
finished  the  sentence  before  he  was  at  the 
burning  house. 

Waving  aside  the  men  who  would  have 
stopped  him,  he  dashed  up  on  the  porch 
and  made  for  the  front  door.  He  had  not 
yet  realized  the  fierceness  of  the  fire.  One 
look  through  the  broad  old  doorway  into 
the  infernal  pit  of  flame  convinced  him  of 
the  absolute  impossibility  of  entrance  there. 
The  fall  of  a  wall  inside  the  building  sud 
denly  threw  the  fire  out  of  the  entrance 
straight  at  him.  He  was  instantly  envel 
oped  in  flame  and  smoke. 

He  turned  and  ran  blindly,  with  an  in 
stinctive  consciousness  for  the  proper 
course,  which  he  could  not  explain,  to  the 
left.  The  house  was  surrounded  by  a  long 
[67] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

porch  extending  around  three  sides  of  it. 
The  smoke  and  flame  obscured  him  for 
the  moment  from  the  gaze  of  the  people  on 
the  lawn,  and  before  the  wind  cleared  the 
porch  temporarily  he  had  vanished.  They 
could  not  tell  what  had  become  of  him. 
They  thought  he  had  entered  and  was  lost. 
As  he  ran  it  occurred  to  him  that  possibly 
the  back  way  was  open,  and  instead  of  re 
turning  to  the  lawn  he  simply  continued 
on  around  the  house  and  was  hidden  from 
their  view.  The  fire  had  not  yet  taken 
such  a  hold  of  the  back  of  the  house  as 
of  the  front.  Although  the  flames  were 
curling  out  of  the  windows  as  he  passed 
he  got  to  the  back  porch  without  difficulty. 
He  made  at  once  for  the  door,  a  heavy 
oak  affair,  which  was  still  intact.  When 
he  put  his  hand  on  the  handle  he  found 
the  door  was  locked.  There  was  fire  in  the 
kitchen  he  could  see  through  the  shuttered 
windows,  but  more  smoke  than  anything 
else.  He  looked  around  for  something 
with  which  to  break  the  door,  and  as  he 
[68] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

did  so  he  heard  the  sound  of  a  fall  within 
followed  by  a  muffled  scream.  There  was 
a  heavy  wooden  bench  on  the  back  porch. 
In  his  excitement  he  picked  it  up  as  if  it 
had  been  a  walking-stick  and  hurled  it  vio 
lently  against  the  door.  The  lock  gave 
way  and  the  door  flew  open  with  a  crash. 
The  black  smoke  poured  out  upon  him  in 
a  sickening  volume. 

The  room  had  been  tightly  closed,  and 
as  the  air  rushed  through  the  door  it  seemed 
to  break  into  fire  everywhere.  The  light 
enabled  him  to  see  a  prostrate  figure  in  the 
far  corner  at  the  foot  of  the  back  stair. 
Filling  his  lungs  with  air,  crouching  low 
to  get  as  near  the  floor  as  he  could,  and 
holding  his  breath,  he  made  his  way  over 
the  burning  planks  through  the  smoke  until 
he  reached  the  figure.  The  heap  was  a 
dazed,  half  fainting  woman.  The  fire  was 
already  touching  her  garments.  Without 
losing  a  second  he  gathered  her  up  uncere 
moniously  and  started  for  the  entrance. 
Instinctively  she  buried  her  face  in  his 

[69] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

coat,  and  in  a  moment  they  had  gained  the 
door  and  were  out  in  the  open  air.  As  he 
passed  through  the  doorway  her  foot, 
hanging  limp  over  his  arm,  struck  against 
the  door-post.  A  sharp  cry  of  pain  broke 
from  her  lips.  Something  seemed  to  re 
store  her  to  full  consciousness.  He  had 
no  time  to  inquire  what  it  was  at  the  mo 
ment,  for  he  dropped  her  on  the  grass  — 
he  observed  that  she  could  not  stand  — 
and  began  tearing  the  smouldering  skirt 
from  her,  getting  his  hands  well  burned  in 
the  process.  When  that  operation  was 
finished  he  lifted  her  up  again,  carried  her 
farther  away  from  the  house,  and  placed 
her  once  more  upon  the  grass. 

"  My  —  thesis !  "  she  gasped  out,  as  he 
laid  her  down  for  the  last  time.  "  I  went 
back  for  it  —  and " 

;'  Where  is  it?  "  he  asked  abruptly. 

He  was  a  college  man  and  he  could  un 
derstand  her  anxiety.  Something  in  the 
spirit  of  a  person  who,  having  escaped 
death  as  it  were  by  the  skin  of  the  teeth, 
[70] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

and  who  was  evidently  suffering  great  an 
guish,  from  her  white,  drawn  face,  who 
could  yet  think  of  a  thesis,  appealed  to  him. 

"  Where  is  it?" 

"  I  tried  the  front  stairs,"  she  said, 
"  but  it  was  too  late.  Then  I  came  down 
the  blind  stairway  into  the  kitchen.  When 
I  opened  the  door  I  fell  and  dropped 
the  thesis.  I  have  worked  for  two  years 
on  it." 

"  I'll  get  it,"  he  said,  turning  and  leav 
ing  her. 

It  was  a  foolish  and  foolhardy  per 
formance  to  which  he  had  so  simply  en 
gaged  himself.  Had  he  been  older  he 
would  never  have  dreamed  of  such  a  thing. 
And,  to  do  her  justice,  if  she  had  been 
quite  herself  Alicia  would  never  have  sug 
gested  or  allowed  it.  She  could  cheerfully 
risk  her  own  life  for  such  a  cause,  but  she 
would  not  have  permitted  another  to  do  so. 
Yet  he  made  the  endeavor,  and  success-  ' 
fully.  The  fire  was  much  hotter  than  it 
had  been,  but  it  was  still  possible  for  him 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

to  pass  over  the  floor,  though  now  he  knew 
he  went  at  the  risk  of  his  life.  It  was 
blazing  all  around  the  spot  where  the  roll 
of  paper  had  lodged,  but  the  precious  docu 
ment  was  still  intact.  He  repeated  his  for 
mer  precaution,  then  plunged  recklessly  in. 
This  time  he  had  no  heavy  woman  to  carry 
out,  and  it  was  well  that  he  had  not,  for 
his  clothes  were  flaming  when  he  reached 
the  door.  He  had  taken  no  serious  hurt, 
however,  and  he  rolled  himself  on  the 
ground  instantly,  which  put  out  the  fire, 
although  the  thesis  got  badly  crushed  in 
the  process.  Then  he  hurried  to  where  he 
had  left  the  girl  lying  on  the  grass. 

"  I  have  it !  "  he  cried. 

She  made  no  answer,  and,  looking  closer 
at  her,  he  discovered  that  she  had  fainted. 
It  was  the  first  opportunity  he  had  to  more 
than  glance  at  her,  and  the  fire  gave  him 
light  enough  to  see  that  she  was  beautiful. 
His  gaze  swept  her  from  head  to  foot. 
One  of  her  feet,  without  its  shoe,  was  ex 
tended  on  the  grass  beneath  the  charred 
[72] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

petticoat  in  an  unnatural  position.  An 
other  man  might  not  have  noticed  any 
thing  amiss,  but  he  was  a  physician ;  being 
young  his  professional  instincts  were  the 
stronger,  and  he  stooped  down  to  see 
what  injury  she  had  sustained,  for  some 
thing  was  wrong  with  the  shoeless  foot 
evidently. 

He  was  all  action  once  more.  Forget 
ful  of  the  fact  that  his  hands  were  blis 
tered,  that  his  hair  was  singed  grotesquely, 
and  that  he  was  black  with  smoke  and 
burned  in  places,  he  drew  his  penknife 
from  his  pocket,  in  default  of  other  in 
strument,  lifted  the  little  foot,  skilfully 
slit  the  girl's  stocking,  and  laid  bare  her 
ankle.  A  few  manipulations,  which  be 
spoke  assurance  and  ability,  apprised  him 
what  was  the  trouble.  It  was  a  forward 
dislocation  of  the  ankle.  The  absence  of 
crepitation  assured  him  that  the  ankle  was 
not  broken.  He  glanced  up  from  her 
white  foot  to  her  whiter  face.  She  was 
still  unconscious.  If  he  could  reduce  the 
[73] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

dislocation  before  she  revived  she  would 
thank  him  in  the  end. 

He  seized  the  ankle  in  his  strong,  skilled 
hands,  worked  over  it  for  a  moment,  and 
finally  forced  the  bones  back  into  place. 
His  instincts  and  observations,  since  he  had 
discovered  the  accident,  had  been  entirely 
impersonal  and  scientific,  he  had  handled 
her  with  the  impassivity  of  his  profession. 
Not  until  he  had  completed  the  task  did 
he  notice  the  beauty  of  the  foot  and  ankle 
in  his  hand,  and  at  that  moment,  with  a 
cry,  probably  extorted  from  her  by  the 
pain  of  the  reduction,  the  girl  lifted  her 
head,  struggled  a  moment,  raised  herself 
upon  her  arm,  and  stared  at  him  in  bewil 
derment. 

"  Saved  now,"  he  said,  smiling  at  her 
cheerfully,  "  and  your  ankle  will  be  all 
right  with  a  little  nursing." 

"My  thesis?" 

"  Here  it  is." 

"  Thank  you  very " 

At  that  juncture  Miss  Winthrop,  at- 
[74] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

tended  by  some  of  the  girls,  burst  upon 
the  scene.  She  had  only  at  the  last  mo 
ment  bethought  her  of  the  back  of  the 
house.  She  saw  the  kneeling  figure  and 
the  recumbent  one. 

"  Oh  !  "  she  cried.    "  Have  you ?  " 

"  She  is  safe,  madam,"  said  the  man, 
rising  to  his  feet.  "  She  had  come  down 
to  the  kitchen.  I  got  in  without  difficulty, 
and  we  got  out  without  much  more.  She 
had  gone  back  for  her  thesis,  and  found 
her  escape  cut  off."  He  discreetly  said 
nothing  about  his  own  part  in  rescuing  that 
document.  "  The  young  lady  is  all  right, 
too,  with  the  exception  of  a  dislocation  of 
her  ankle,  which  she  got  in  the  kitchen, 
and  which  absolutely  prevented  her  from 
moving.  The  pain  must  have  been  fright 
ful.  I  fear  I  banged  it  against  the  door 
post  in  bringing  her  out.  As  it  is,  I  have 
just  taken  advantage  of  her  unconscious 
condition  to  reduce  the  sprain — I  am  a 
physician — and  all  she  needs  now  is  good 
bandaging  and  careful  nursing." 

[751 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

"  Oh,  sir,"  began  the  principal,  stooping 
down  and  gathering  the  girl  in  her  arms, 
"  you  have  done  nobly,  you  are " 

"  It's  nothing,  Miss  Winthrop,"  said 
the  young  man,  smiling  through  his  grime 
and  smoke  and  pain,  "  nothing  at  all. 
Any  man  would  have  done  it." 

"  I  cannot  allow  you  to  say  so,  sir,"  said 
the  principal.  "  This  is  Miss  Alicia  Chal- 
den.  Her  father  —  there  will  be  —  a  — 
reward " 

"  To  have  been  of  service  to  Miss  Chal- 
den  is  reward  enough,"  interrupted  the 
young  man  lightly.  "  But  I  think,"  with 
an  apprehensive  glance  toward  the  dormi 
tory,  "  that  we  would  better  move  farther 
from  the  house.  The  walls  might  come 
down  at  any  moment,  and  if  you  will  al 
low  me,  the  young  lady  can  hardly  walk 
yet "  —  he  stooped  down  once  more  and 
lifted  the  girl  in  his  arms  again.  Before 
he  did  so  he  put  her  thesis  in  her  hand. 
Followed  by  the  grateful  principal  and 


the  other  girls  he  carried  her  toward  the 
nearest  dormitory. 

By  this  time  a  fire  company  from  Phila 
delphia,  accompanied  by  physicians,  had 
arrived  on  a  special  train. 

"  If  you  will  carry  her  in  there,"  said 
Miss  Winthrop,  pointing  to  the  first  room 
off  the  hall,  "  I  will  advise  these  people 
as  to  what  is  to  be  done  and  return  in  a 
moment." 

The  young  man  accordingly  deposited 
his  burden  on  a  couch  in  the  parlor  and 
turned  away.  The  girl  caught  his  hand. 

'  You  have  saved  my  life,  and  my  the 
sis:  I  had  worked  years  on  that,"  she  mur 
mured.  "  I  shall  never  forget  you." 

"  It  is  nothing,  Miss  Chalden,"  an 
swered  the  young  man,  striving  gently  to 
draw  away  his  hand. 

"  It's  everything  to  me,"  she  answered. 
"  We  have  looked  death  in  the  face  to 
gether." 

There  was  a  world  of  meaning  in  the 
[77] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

words.  His  heart  leaped  at  the  sound  of 
them,  and  then,  before  he  could  divine  her 
intention,  she  lifted  his  burned  and  bleed 
ing  hand  to  her  lips  and  kissed  it.  Then 
she  sank  back  on  the  couch,  exhausted  by 
all  that  she  had  gone  through.  Leaving 
her  with  some  of  the  teachers  and  her  class 
mates,  the  young  man  quickly  withdrew 
from  the  room  and,  unnoticed  in  the  con 
fusion,  traversed  the  campus,  climbed  pain 
fully  over  the  fence,  mounted  his  horse, 
and  galloped  away.  He  had  been  passing 
the  grounds  by  the  merest  chance,  when  he 
had  seen  the  fire,  and  had  come  to  do  what 
he  could.  And  he  had  done  it. 

It  was  not  until  next  morning  that  Miss 
Winthrop  and  Alicia  Chalden,  in  talking 
over  the  gallant  rescue,  realized  that  they 
had  not  learned  the  name  of  the  man  who 
had  so  superbly  met  the  emergency. 


178] 


V 


IN  the  two  months  that  had  elapsed 
since  the  burning  of  Hulswood  Hall 
Doctor  William  Penn  Whyot  had  managed 
to  see  Miss  Alicia  Chalden  three  or  four 
times,  each  time  himself  unseen.  He  had, 
of  course,  immediately  satisfied  himself  by 
thorough  if  concealed  inquiry  that  she  had 
sustained  no  permanent  injury  from  her 
adventure. 

Whyot  was  no  drone  in  the  world's 
affairs.  He  worked  as  hard  at  his  pro 
fession  as  the  poorest  doctor  ever  did. 
Most  of  his  patients  were  among  the  very 
poor,  who,  in  accordance  with  the  peculiar 
arrangement  of  Philadelphia,  lived  at  his 
back  door,  within  a  stone's  throw  of  the 
Pine  Street  quarter.  He  was  a  scientist 
and  a  physician  because  he  loved  his  pro 
fession,  and  for  no  other  reason.  But 
whenever  he  could  take  the  time  for  a  ride 
[79] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

in  the  country,  since  the  fire,  he  had  in 
stinctively  turned  his  horse  so  as  to  pass  by 
the  Brookford  College  grounds.  There  he 
had  seen  Alicia  watching  the  others  playing 
tennis,  it  was  before  the  days  of  golf  —  in 
America  at  least  —  or  he  had  caught  fleet 
ing  glimpses  of  her  once  in  a  while  strolling 
under  the  old  trees. 

He  was  in  love  with  her.  The  one  or 
two  glimpses  he  had  caught  of  her  face  in 
the  firelight  that  night  had  impressed  her 
beauty  upon  his  consciousness  as  a  more 
conventional  sight  could  never  have  done. 
He  could  not  explain  his  feeling  for  her, 
nor  could  he  understand  how  it  had  arisen. 
But  however  it  was,  he  had  to  recognize 
the  fact.  He  had  read  of  such  things,  and 
laughed  —  now  he  knew  they  were  true. 
He  made  no  struggle.  Why  should  he? 
He  loved  her,  in  secret,  but  with  an  increas 
ing,  possessing,  consuming  passion  as  burn 
ing  in  his  soul  as  the  fire  through  which 
he  had  carried  her.  There  was  no  attempt 
on  his  part  to  disguise  the  fact  from  him- 
[80] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

self,  although  naturally  he  told  no  one  else. 
He  was  alone  in  the  world  with  the  excep 
tion  of  the  widowed  aunt  and  his  bachelor 
uncle  who  lived  in  another  Pine  Street 
house  near  his  own.  They  should  know  in 
due  time,  meanwhile  he  would  keep  it  to 
himself.  The  man  —  and  eke  the  woman 
—  who  keeps  his  love  affairs  to  himself  is 
apt  to  prove  the  most  successful  lover. 

The  circumstances  of  his  meeting  with 
Alicia  had  been  so  strange  and  so  roman 
tic;  as  she  had  said,  when  she  had  kissed  his 
hand,  they  had  looked  death  in  the  face 
together,  and  in  that  glance  love  had  been 
born;  therefore,  so  he  reasoned,  they  be 
longed  to  each  other  forever.  The  papers 
rang  with  accounts  of  the  gallant  and 
heroic  rescue  of  the  millionaire's  daughter 
and  her  thesis,  but  no  one  discovered  his 
name,  and  he  kept  it  religiously  secret.  He 
did  not  wish  to  make  himself  known  to  her 
yet.  He  ascertained  that  she  would  grad 
uate  in  the  spring — he  might  have  guessed 
that  from  the  affair  of  the  thesis — and  he 
[Si] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

resolved  to  wait  until  then.  Waiting  would 
do  no  harm,  he  reasoned,  with  unusual 
astuteness  for  a  lover,  and  he  was  right. 

There  was  a  fierceness  of  purpose,  an 
intensity  of  energy  about  the  doctor  that 
was  utterly  absent  from  the  other  members 
of  his  family,  which,  indeed,  had  not  been 
evidenced  by  any  of  them  for  generations. 
He  had  a  touch  of  the  temperament  of  his 
old  French  ancestor,  and  when  to  this 
resurrected  strain  of  dashing  gallantry  and 
gayety  was  added  the  dogged  determina 
tion  of  his  German  cross  —  well,  Alicia,  if 
she  had  known  anything  about  it,  might  as 
well  have  surrendered  without  a  struggle. 

Alicia  did  not  know  anything  about  it, 
of  course.  She  did  not  even  know  the 
name  of  her  gallant  rescuer,  but  neverthe 
less  she  was  quite  prepared  to  surrender 
when  the  demand  was  made. 

The  fleeting  glimpses  she  had  caught  in 

the  firelight  of  the  doctor's  face,  smoked 

and  scorched  though  it  was,  had  moved 

her  strangely.     He  had  burst  upon  her  in 

[82] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 


her  direst  hour,  when  she  had  commended 
herself  to  God  and  given  up  hope  —  peo 
ple  do  not  usually  commend  themselves  to 
God  until  they  have  lost  hope,  by  the  way ! 
She  recalled  the  quick,  masterful  way 
with  which,  without  explanation  or  un 
necessary  words,  he  had  effected  her  res 
cue.  In  the  midst  of  her  terror  she  had 
been  conscious  of  the  strength  with  which 
he  had  held  her  to  him  and  carried  her 
through  that  inferno  until  she  had  fainted. 
Even  the  thrill  of  exquisite  anguish  which 
had  brought  her  out  of  her  unconscious 
ness  and  discovered  him  at  her  feet,  was 
sweet  in  her  memory.  She  would  willing 
ly  suffer  to  see  him  there  once  more.  Yet 
in  the  privacy  of  her  chamber,  when  her 
heart  lingered  upon  the  picture,  the  blood 
rushed  to  her  face  like  another  flame  as 
she  thought  of  the  man  at  her  bare  foot. 
She  could  not  at  all  regard  him  in  the 
light  of  a  physician.  It  was  in  Alicia's 
mind  a  lover  who  was  there  —  and  Alicia 
was  right. 

[83] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

A  benefit  conferred  oftentimes  means  a 
friendship  shattered,  but  there  are  rare 
natures  which  it  binds  with  the  grappling 
hooks  of  gifts  remembered.  Alicia's  was 
one  of  these.  One  might  not  have  said 
that  she  loved  the  doctor.  Men  yield 
first  to,  and  acknowledge  most  freely,  the 
passion.  Women  are  passive,  less  daring, 
until  the  acknowledgment  is  made,  then 
they  more  often  become  the  bolder  sex. 
Yet  at  a  touch  Alicia  was  ready  to  yield — 
and  she  did  not  even  know  the  name  of 
the  man ! 

Such  inquiries  as  they  could  make  Miss 
Winthrop  had  caused  to  be  put  in  circula 
tion,  but  no  one  could  tell  anything.  Her 
rescuer,  Alicia  learned  from  her  college- 
mates,  had  appeared  as  suddenly  as  if  he 
had  dropped  from  the  clouds.  He  had 
done  his  work  promptly  and  successfully, 
and  then  had  vanished,  taking  her  kiss 
upon  his  hand  away  with  him.  Had  it  not 
been  for  the  burning  building,  the  long, 
tedious  days  of  recovery  from  her  dislo- 
[84] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

cated  ankle,  the  crumpled  thesis  —  which, 
to  her  joy,  she  found  practically  intact  — 
she  might  have  believed  it  all  a  dream. 

Alicia  was  vastly  provoked  at  her  in 
ability  to  find  out  anything  about  the  man. 
Even  her  powerful  father,  who  had  set  in 
motion  all  the  resources  at  his  command  — 
and  that  practically  amounted  to  every 
thing  in  Philadelphia  of  value — was  unable 
to  discover  anything.  And  her  ignorance 
of  the  man  made  him  the  more  interesting 
to  her.  It  is  the  unknown  that  we  fear,  but 
it  is  also  the  unknown  that  appeals.  In  ig 
norance  of  his  character  or  characteristics, 
she  made  a  hero  of  him.  Perhaps  that  ig 
norance  is  necessary  to  the  making  of 
heroes  —  in  the  present.  She  endowed  him 
with  every  grace  and  every  virtue,  and  then 
she  loved  the  ideal  she  had  created  —  the 
usual  way. 

Philip  Chalden  had  offered  to  proclaim 

a  vast  reward  in  the  hope  of  bringing  the 

unknown   man   to  light,    but  Alicia,   with 

clearer   insight,   had  refused  to    allow  it. 

[85] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

There  are  services  rendered  —  by  some 
people,  that  is  —  which  cannot  be  paid 
with  money.  Alicia  divined  that  this  man 
was  such  an  one.  She  could  not  have 
loved  him  otherwise.  He  would  not  have 
been  her  hero  then.  Money  would  be 
nothing  to  such  an  one  as  he.  She  stood 
ready  —  though  she  did  not  admit  it  — 
to  say  yes  to  any  other  demand  for  reward 
he  might  make,  even  to  giving  him  her 
self.  Ah,  Doctor  Whyot  was  a  wise  man 
indeed  —  and  a  fortunate  as  well. 

Alicia  longed  for  a  sight  of  her  rescuer 
once  more,  but  she  did  not  despair  of  see 
ing  him,  and  soon.  She  was  young,  just 
turned  twenty-one,  when  the  accident  oc 
curred,  and  she  had  abundant  hope.  She 
was  firmly  convinced  that  Heaven  had 
arranged  the  first  meeting  —  in  spite  of 
the  fact  that  a  building  had  to  be  burned 
down  to  bring  it  about,  which  was  illogical 
but  feminine  —  and  she  was  equally  as 
sured  that  in  a  short  time  in  some  other 
way  another  meeting  would  occur  —  even 
[86] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

if  another  building  had  to  be  burned  down  ! 
So  she  allowed  the  image  of  the  man,  or 
perhaps  it  would  be  more  truthful  to  say 
her  ideal  of  him,  constantly  to  grow  greater 
in  her  heart,  arid  she  waited  for  him  with 
such  patience  as  she  could  muster. 

Possibly  Alicia  would  have  been  more 
unhappy  in  her  ignorance  had  it  not  been 
that  she  had  a  mission  in  her  life.  A  mis 
sion  is  often  a  salvation  in  an  emergency 
or  crisis.  That  mission  was  the  ameliora 
tion  of  the  condition  of  the  negro.  She 
knew  nothing  practically  about  the  negro. 
Her  earliest  memories  were  of  an  ancient 
Italian  town  where  she  believed  she  had 
been  born.  It  had  been  only  fifteen  years 
since  her  father  had  returned  to  America, 
bringing  her  with  him,  and  all  that  time 
she  had  been  at  school,  first  in  the  prepara 
tory  department  auxiliary  to  Brookford 
College,  then  in  the  college  itself.  But  if 
her  practical  acquaintance  with  the  subject 
was  nothing,  her  theoretical  knowledge  was 
great.  Reality  and  theory  are  usually  in 
[87] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

inverse   ratio  to  each  other,   especially  in 
sociological  discussions. 

The  college,  on  account  of  the  deserved 
ly  high  reputation  of  its  principal,  and  be 
cause  of  the  excellence  of  its  faculty,  had 
a  very  high  standing  among  similar  insti 
tutions,  and  many  people  there  were  from 
New  England  who  matriculated  thereat. 
Alicia  had  fallen  under  the  influence  of 
some  of  the  most  advanced  thinkers  upon 
the  subject  as  represented  in  New  Eng 
land,  Miss  Winthrop  herself  being  from 
an  ancient  Boston  family.  The  tendency 
of  that  section  at  that  time  —  and  Miss 
Winthrop  adequately  represented  it  —  was 
not  only  to  consider  the  negro  as  a  man 
and  a  brother,  but  almost  as  a  man  and  a 
superior,  although  temporarily  in  reduced 
circumstances  and  humble  condition.  If 
the  actualities  of  the  negro  were  nothing, 
his  possibilities  were  everything.  Alicia's 
idea  of  ameliorating  the  condition  of  the 
negro  was,  first  of  all,  to  convince  him  of 
his  absolute  and  inherent  equality  with 
[88] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

the  dominant  race  from  every  point  of 
view. 

She  literally  threw  her  splendid  person 
ality  into  hard  study  of  the  problem  from 
books  and  theorists.  There  was  not  a 
negro  within  ten  miles  of  Brookford 
College  upon  whom  she  could  experi 
ment,  but  the  literature  on  the  subject, 
which  was  at  that  time  mainly  written  by 
New  England  people,  was  at  her  com 
mand.  She  determined  to  devote  all  she 
could  command  of  her  father's  fortune, 
which  she  vaguely  realized  was  a  vast  one, 
to  the  forcing  of  the  social,  intellectual, 
moral,  spiritual,  legal  —  and  every  other 
kind  of  adjectival  —  recognition  of  the 
negro  by  everybody  who  did  not  think  as 
she.  That  her  father  might  have  some 
thing  to  say  upon  that  subject,  that  he 
might  have  an  opinion  of  his  own,  had 
never  occurred  to  her. 

Alicia  was  as  enthusiastic  as  she  was  ig 
norant,  as  visionary  as  she  was  beautiful, 
and  as  determined  as  she  was  impractical 
[89] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

—  a  dangerous  combination  of  faults,  virt 
ues,  power,  she.  Hers  was  an  unusual 
mission,  but  then  Alicia  was  an  unusual 
girl  in  many  respects.  She  had  wondered 
how  the  unknown  man  who  had  suddenly 
swept  her  to  his  heart,  and  into  his  heart 
perhaps,  and  had  become  an  integral  part 
of  her  future  dreams,  might  regard  such 
an  idea.  Well,  he  should  never  be  any 
thing  to  her  —  he  had  got  that  far  in  her 
affections,  you  see  —  if  he  were  not  will 
ing  to  co-operate  in  every  way  in  her  de 
sign. 

Alicia  was  the  first  student  in  her  class. 
And  she  sacrificed  no  womanly  grace  or 
charm  in  reaching  that  position.  She  was 
a  sort  of  "  Admirable  Crichton  "  among 
the  femininity  of  Brookford.  Consequent 
ly,  at  her  graduation,  she  was  allotted  the 
closing  essay  and  valedictory.  The  thesis 
upon  which  she  had  won  her  doctorate 
in  philosophy,  which  was  to  be  con 
ferred  at  the  commencement  exercises,  was 
upon  the  integral  equality  of  the  black  and 
[90] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

white  races  —  of  all  sorts  and  colors  of 
men,  in  fact.  Doctor  Whyot,  on  account  of 
his  family  connection  with  the  college,  had 
always  received  invitations  to  the  graduat 
ing  exercises,  which  he  had  never  before 
attended.  He  had  counted  upon  the  in 
vitation  during  the  two  months  that  in 
tervened  between  the  momentous  day  and 
the  night  of  the  fire,  and  this  time,  to  the 
great  surprise  of  the  principal,  he  promptly 
accepted.  He  would  see  Alicia  again  face 
to  face  and  make  himself  known.  What 
would  the  result  be  ? 

When  he  came  into  the  great  hall  of  the 
college  he  paid  his  respects  to  Miss  Win- 
throp,  as  in  duty  bound,  and  was  greeted 
with  flattering  empressement  by  that  worthy 
lady,  who  naturally  failed  to  recognize  the 
scorched  and  somewhat  blackened  mysteri 
ous  adventurer  of  the  burning  building  in 
the  handsome,  distinguished,  well-dressed 
young  man  before  her.  The  same  feeling 
which  had  kept  Whyot  from  making  him 
self  known  to  Alicia  induced  him  to  take 
[91] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

a  seat  far  back  in  the  audience.  He  lis 
tened  in  a  perfunctory  manner  to  the  pro 
found  and  subtle  efforts  of  the  young  en 
thusiasts  who  grappled  with  subjects  that 
had  engaged  the  minds  of  wise  men  and 
women  for  centuries  —  and  settled  them 
out  of  hand.  He  heard,  with  a  smile  of 
amusement,  possible  Utopias  outlined  and 
Orphic  mysteries  revealed  by  some  femi 
nine  voice  coming  to  him  from  billows  of 
lace  and  parterres  of  tulle.  He  longed 
the  while  for  the  time  when  he  should  hear 
Alicia  attempt  the  solution  of  the  greatest 
problem  that  presses  upon  the  American 
people  —  her  subject  he  read  on  the  pro 
gramme  —  the  problem  that  began  when 
the  Jesus,  a  Dutch  man-of-war  of  ill-sorted 
name,  brought  twenty  "  negars "  into 
Jamestown  in  1620,  and  which  grows 
greater  with  every  passing  decade  in  the 
history  of  the  Republic  —  What  to  do 
with  the  negro !  Not  that  he  should  care 
much  for  Alicia's  opinion,  he  thought,  but 
merely  that  he  might  hear  her  voice  again. 
[92] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

The  negroes,  to  whom  a  large  portion  of 
his  skill  and  knowledge  was  devoted,  were 
very  fond  of  Doctor  Whyot.  He  did  his 
duty  by  them  impartially,  treated  them 
just  as  he  did  the  other  poor  patients  who 
clamored  at  his  door,  but  he  did  it  under 
mental  duress.  He  disliked  the  negro  on 
every  account,  but  so  stern  was  his  idea  of 
duty  that,  in  his  endeavor  not  to  discrimi 
nate  against  them,  probably  he  overstepped 
the  mark  upon  the  other  side,  and  showed 
them  more  favor  and  kindness  than  they 
otherwise  would  have  received  —  therefore 
they  loved  him.  Among  the  whole  race, 
as  he  had  come  in  contact  with  it,  there  was 
but  one  whom  he  really  respected,  and  that 
was  a  certain  man  who  had  been  a  class 
mate  of  his  at  Harvard. 

When  he  had  first  noticed  Alicia's  sub 
ject  upon  the  programme,  he  had  been  con 
scious  of  a  faint  feeling  of  disgust,  not 
with  her,  but  with  the  subject  —  and  that 
she  should  have  wasted  herself  upon  so 
hopeless  a  problem.  The  disgust  vanished 
[93] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

the   minute   Alicia    stepped   on    the    plat 
form. 

Heavens!  He  had  never  dreamed  of 
beauty  like  that.  The  clear,  passionate 
paleness  of  her  face,  the  gray  brilliancy  of 
her  eyes,  the  scarlet  fulness  of  her  lips,  the 
mass  of  blue-black  hair  above  her  broad 
brow,  were  the  only  details  that  he  could 
discern  from  his  distant  point  of  view,  but 
the  poise  of  her  head,  her  carriage,  the 
grace  with  which  she  stepped  forward,  the 
dignity  in  bow  and  manner,  all  impressed 
him  profoundly. 

He  was  conscious  of  birth  and  breeding. 
The  outward  signs,  the  evidences  of  aris 
tocracy  and  long  descent,  upon  which  those 
who  possess  them  love  to  dwell — and  at 
which  those  who  do  not,  love  to  mock — 
were  all  there.  The  slender  hand  that 
held  the  thesis,  the  curve  and  sweep  of  her 
figure,  and  the  foot  advanced  beneath  her 
skirt  —  ah,  that  was  scarcely  discernible 
from  where  he  sat,  but  the  remembrance 
of  it  was  hidden  in  his  heart. 
[94] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

Her  voice,  low  and  somewhat  languid, 
as  befitted  her  southern  and  semi-oriental 
appearance,  nevertheless  penetrated  to  the 
extreme  end  of  the  hall.  His  heart  would 
have  heard  it  and  beat  at  the  sound  of  it, 
though  it  had  been  earth  in  its  earthy  bed, 
he  thought.  He  watched  the  parted  lips 
as  one  fascinated,  the  lips  that  had  pressed 
his  hand.  He  looked  down  upon  that 
brown  and  hardy  member,  and  involun 
tarily  started  to  raise  it  to  his  own  lips.  Of 
what  the  girl  was  saying  he  was  hardly 
conscious.  She  could  say  what  she  pleased, 
he  did  not  care.  She  might  do  what  she 
pleased,  it  made  no  difference  to  him.  He 
had  known  that  he  loved  her  as  he  had 
galloped  up  the  avenue  and  gazed  at  her 
under  the  trees,  but  now  he  realized  it  with 
a  different  force,  it  was  a  revelation.  Why 
had  he  waited  so  long  ?  He  had  been  a  fool ! 

And  suddenly,  like  an  electric  flash,  the 

girl's  eyes  fastened  themselves  upon  him. 

She   saw,   she   recognized,   she  conquered, 

she  was  conquered.     A  slow  color  flooded 

[95] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

her  face.  For  a  moment  she  hesitated,  fal 
tered,  and  then  recovering  herself  she  went 
on.  In  that  great  assemblage,  after  that, 
she  saw  only  this  man.  She  spoke  only  to 
him.  She  was  dealing  with  a  thing  dearest 
to  her  mind  and  pleading  with  the  person 
nearest  to  her  heart.  She  instinctively 
realized,  with  the  first  flash  of  recognition 
between  them,  that  he,  if  he  thought  about 
it  at  all,  would  be  unfriendly  to  her  posi 
tion;  and  she  set  herself,  with  the  enthusi 
asm  of  that  love  which  craves  unity  and 
harmony  —  reciprocation  —  to  reach  its 
highest  development,  to  convince  him,  to 
make  him  think  as  she. 

All  that  she  had  studied  and  read  for 
three  years,  all  that  she  had  written  and 
rewritten,  it  flashed  into  her  mind,  had 
been  to  enable  her  to  convince  this  one 
man.  She  forgot  the  negro  as  she  pleaded 
for  the  allegiance  of  this  man;  and  she 
received  it.  Such  pleading  would  have 
moved  a  stone.  With  an  eloquence  for 
eign  to  woman,  which  was  enhanced  by  the 
[96] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

very  unusualness  of  her  subject,  and  by  her 
beauty  and  charm,  she  moved  him  to  ac 
quiescence,  and  she  also  carried  the  rest  of 
the  audience  with  her.  It  wa-s  a  reflex 
reaction  caused  by  the  earnest  and  power 
ful  appeal  to  the  man  she  loved,  and  who 
loved  her. 

The  hall  rang  with  applause  as  she  fin 
ished.  Men  and  women  stood  up  and 
clapped  and  clapped  again  and  again  —  a 
most  unusual  proceeding  for  Philadelphia, 
which  may  be  accounted  for  by  the  fact 
that  Brookford  College  gathered  its  stu 
dents  and  its  audience  from  all  parts  of 
the  country.  It  was  such  a  triumph  as 
few  young  women  have  ever  achieved. 
Miss  Winthrop,  in  her  long  connection 
with  the  college,  could  remember  nothing 
like  it.  The  happy  principal's  voice  trem 
bled  with  emotion  as  she  bestowed  upon 
the  happier  girl  —  for  she  had  convinced 
the  one  whose  opinion  she  valued !  —  the 
coveted  degree  of  Doctor  of  Philosophy 
summa  arm  laude! 

[97] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

Philip  Chalden  had  never  cared  much 
for  his  daughter  before.  He  had  done  a 
father's  duty  by  her,  he  had  provided  her 
with  everything  she  could  wish  for,  he  had 
seen  that  she  lacked  nothing,  that  she  was 
well  cared  for,  and  then  he  had  mainly  left 
her  to  others ;  but  that  night,  as  he  sat  back 
in  the  far  corner  of  the  room,  he  thrilled 
with  pride.  He  was  a  loveless,  lonely  old 
man.  Alicia  and  himself  constituted  his 
family.  Now  the  girl  was  a  success.  She 
knew  something.  Hard-hearted,  practical 
as  he  was,  with  centuries  of  inherited  preju 
dice  from  his  Southern  forebears  in  oppo 
sition  to  her  views,  she  did  not  convince 
him  for  a  single  moment;  he  could  have 
torn  her  arguments  to  tatters,  but  she  had 
spoken  with  such  grace  and  charm  and 
spirit;  she  had  made  such  a  good  thing 
out  of  an  impossible  proposition;  she  had 
proved  such  a  good  advocate  in  a  desperate 
situation  —  desperate  from  his  standpoint 
—  and  she  was  so  convinced  herself  that 
her  position  was  unassailable,  her  logic 
[98] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

unquestionable,  her  conclusions  absolute, 
that  the  old  man,  who  liked  confidence,  and 
success,  and  who  worshipped  ability  as  his 
god,  felt  strangely  drawn  toward  her.  If 
she  could  thus  advocate  an  absurd  and  er 
roneous  view,  what  might  she  not  do  with 
truth!  And  yet  the  strangeness  of  her 
subject  came  home  to  him  as  to  no  one 
else  who  heard  her.  That  subject  — 
and  he  smiled  in  mockery  as  he  remem 
bered. 

So  two  men  in  that  great  audience 
looked  upon  the  girl  that  night  with  eyes 
of  affection  —  a  lover  and  a  father.  It 
was  she  herself  who  brought  them  to 
gether.  Compelled  by  an  irresistible  de 
sire  Whyot  had  gone  toward  her  after  the 
exercises  were  over.  He  had  waited  on 
the  outskirts  of  the  throng  buzzing  around 
her  with  praise  and  congratulations,  until 
she  disposed  of  them  all,  and  turned  eager 
ly  to  him.  It  seemed  ages  to  her  before 
she  could  devote  to  him  a  moment's  atten 
tion.  A  little  eddy  in  the  passing  crowd 
[99] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

left  them  alone  for  the  moment,  and  others 
approaching,  seeing  the  intentness  of  her 
greeting,  stepped  aside. 

"  Miss  Chalden,"  he  began  as  she  ex 
tended  her  hand,  both  hands,  to  him,  "  it 
was  magnificent !  " 

"  I  am  so  glad  you  have  come  back  to 
me,"  she  said  softly,  forgetful  of  every 
thing  else.  "  I  can  thank  you  now." 

"Don't!  It  was  a  happiness  to  serve 
you — "  he  bent  such  a  glance  upon  her 
that  brought  the  color  to  her  pale  face. 
"  I  would  lay  down  my  life  for  you,"  he 
added  simply. 

In  the  meeting  of  a  great  passion  con 
ventionalities  are  swept  away.  The  love 
in  his  heart  spoke  in  his  voice,  flamed  in 
his  eyes.  They  had  looked  death  in  the 
face  together,  they  both  remembered  again. 
And  the  woman,  in  the  midst  of  that 
crowded  hall,  heard  his  voice,  divined  his 
love,  and  returned  it.  The  long  lashes  he 
marked  curving  so  gracefully  swept  her 
cheek  for  a  moment,  then  she  lifted  her 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

eyes,  and  looked  upon  him  bravely,  her 
soul  in  her  swimming  glance. 

"  I  know,"  she  whispered  breathlessly, 
"  I  know." 

And  thus  the  compact  was  sealed,  never 
to  be  broken.  So  they  thought. 

"  I  do  not  know  your  name,"  she  said 
at  last,  smiling  faintly  up  at  him;  tall  as 
she  was,  he  towered  above  her. 

It  was  only  a  detail  now,  she  knew  the 
man,  nothing  else  mattered. 

"Whyot,"  he  answered;  "William 
Penn  Whyot." 

"  Father,"  she  said,  suddenly  turning  to 
the  older  man,  who  had  at  last  come  tow 
ard  her. 

"  Alicia,"  said  Chalden,  "  I  am  proud 
of  you.  It  was  all  wrong,  but  it  was 
splendid." 

That  was  more  praise  than  she  had  ever 
received  from  the  silent  man.  His  sincer 
ity  spoke  in  his  look  and  voice. 

"  Father,"  she  continued,  smiling  with 
pleasure  and  turning  again,  "  this  is  Doc- 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

tor  Whyot.  He  carried  me  out  of  the 
dormitory  the  night  of  the  fire.  I  have 
found  him  at  last." 

"  Sir,"  said  the  older  man,  grasping  the 
hand  of  the  younger,  with  more  feeling 
than  he  had  shown  for  years,  "  you  have 
laid  me  under  an  inestimable  obligation.  I 
never  realized  it  until  to-night.  How  can 
I  requite  you?  " 

"  Sir,  there  is  a  way,"  said  Doctor  Why 
ot,  looking  the  other  boldly  in  the  face, 
with  a  courage  and  directness  which 
matched  his  own. 

"  Here,"  thought  Philip  Chalden,  real 
izing  his  meaning,  "  is  a  young  man  who 
is  not  afraid." 

There  were  few  people  who  could  look 
Philip  Chalden  in  the  face  without  blench 
ing.  He  felt  the  same  stimulus  and  pleas 
ure  when  a  man  looked  at  him  in  that  way 
that  a  fencer  feels  when  the  first  thrust  and 
parry  tells  him  that  his  blade  is  crossed  by 
one  worthy  of  all  his  skill  and  courage. 

As    for   Alicia    Chalden,    she   trembled 

I02 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

with  delicious  pleasure  as  she  heard  her 
lover's  answer.  It  could  mean  but  one 
thing.  And  then,  before  they  could  say 
anything  further,  the  crowd  swept  them 
apart,  and  the  romance  of  their  lives  was 
begun. 

Was  it  to  be  a  meeting  only  to  be  swept 
apart  in  the  end? 


C  103] 


VI 


THE  Major's  interview  with  the  mill 
ionaire  had  about  decided  the  ques 
tion  in  Chalden's  mind,  and  the  day  after 
he  gave  his  final  consent  to  an  engagement 
between  Alicia  and  her  lover.  There  were 
reasons  why  the  marriage  between  Alicia 
and  Doctor  Whyot  appeared  especially  de 
sirable  to  Philip  Chalden.  No  definite 
date  was  set  for  the  wedding,  however, 
although  it  was  tacitly  understood  that  it 
should  take  place  late  in  the  approaching 
fall.  Chalden  had  stipulated  that  there 
should  be  no  undue  precipitation  in  the 
affair  —  he  wished  to  assure  himself  of  the 
genuineness  of  his  daughter's  feelings  for 
one  thing  —  and  the  doctor  acquiesced  in 
the  delay  more  willingly  in  the  hope  that 
time  might  enable  him  to  propitiate  his 
wrathful  little  uncle. 

[  104] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

Alicia,  who  went  little  into  society  — 
there  would  be  time  enough  for  that  after 
her  marriage  —  was  happy  in  her  freedom 
from  even  the  gentle  tutelage  of  Brook- 
ford,  and  in  her  new  love  and  lover.  She 
was  quite  content  to  wait  until  the  autumn. 
So  the  arrangement  pleased  everybody, 
even  the  Major,  who  hoped  against  hope 
that  the  delay  might  help  him.  The  Ma 
jor  had  altered  his  will,  but  had  not  yet 
cut  the  acquaintance  of  his  nephew.  It 
would  not  do  to  crush  him  altogether  at 
once.  A  sort  of  armed  truce  subsisted  be 
tween  them. 

Although  Chalden  offered  his  prospec 
tive  son-in-law  various  positions  of  trust 
and  responsibility  in  one  or  another  of  his 
vast  undertakings,  the  doctor  preferred  to 
follow  his  profession,  for  the  time  at  least, 
and  he  sturdily  continued  his  practice,  see 
ing  Alicia,  now  that  she  had  taken  up  her 
abode  at  the  North  Broad  Street  house, 
much  more  frequently  than  when  she  had 
been  at  Brookford.  There  was  a  streak 
[105] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

of  her  father's  business  capacity  and  tenac 
ity  of  purpose  in  Alicia,  and  all  the  mo 
ments  not  occupied  with  her  lover  she  de 
voted  to  the  negro. 

There  lived  in  Philadelphia  at  the  time 
a  clergyman  named  Henry  Olney.  He 
was  the  rector  of  the  Episcopal  Church  of 
the  Cyrenian.  There  were  several  churches 
for  colored  people  in  the  city,  and  this  was 
the  humblest  of  them  all.  It  was  located 
in  the  midst  of  that  locality  where  the 
great  mass  of  the  poorer  negroes  were 
compelled  —  literally  by  the  pressure  upon 
them  of  Jews  and  Gentiles  —  to  live.  It 
was  a  mission  which  was  carried  on  by  the 
white  people  and  was  under  the  control 
of  the  great  Episcopal  Church  of  the 
diocese. 

As  if  to  compensate  the  church  for  its 
lowly  condition  and  the  wretched  character 
of  its  people,  its  priest  was  by  far  the  ablest 
of  those  who  ministered  to  the  colored  peo 
ple  in  the  city  of  Philadelphia.  Indeed,  on 
the  score  of  character,  ability,  and  educa- 
[106] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

tion,  he  could  stand  among  the  best  of  the 
clergy  of  the  city  without  regard  to  any 
conditions.  After  a  course  in  Arts  and 
Letters,  in  which  he  had  taken  highest 
honors  at  Harvard,  he  had  prepared  for 
the  ministry  at  the  General  Theological 
Seminary  in  New  York.  His  work  at  the 
Cyrenian  Church  had  been  successful  to  a 
marked  degree,  considering  the  conditions 
under  which  he  labored,  and  he  had  the  re 
spect  of  all  the  right  thinking  portion  of 
the  community. 

Still  he  was  not  a  happy  man.  He  was 
perhaps  the  loneliest  man  in  the  city  of 
Philadelphia,  for  the  Reverend  Henry 
Olney  was,  technically  speaking,  a  negro. 
That  is,  he  had  one-sixteenth  of  negro 
blood  in  him.  In  person,  in  manners,  in 
habits  of  life,  and  thought,  he  was  prac 
tically  a  white  man.  The  most  rigorous 
scrutiny  failed  to  discover  the  slightest  evi 
dence  that  he  was  a  man  of  color.  If  he 
had  lived  where  his  ancestry  was  unknown, 
and  if  he  had  so  desired,  he  could  have 
[ 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


passed  for  a  white  man  without  question. 
His  association,  especially  at  college,  where 
his  character  and  ability  had  made  him 
much  liked,  had  always  been  with  white 
people.  He  was  unmarried  and  had  no 
relatives  that  he  could  recall.  He  had 
worked  his  way  through  college  and  owed 
no  man  anything.  In  every  sense  of  the 
word  he  was  a  gentleman;  in  thought  as 
well  as  in  action,  in  looks  as  well  as  in 
education,  yet  he  stood  before  the  world 
as  a  black  man. 

However  hard  his  lot,  however  lonely 
his  situation,  there  was  not  the  slightest  in 
tention  on  his  part  of  denying  it.  It  was 
bitter  injustice,  of  course,  that  that  one 
small  infiltration  of  black  blood  should 
dominate  the  more  virile  stock  from  which 
he  sprang,  should  cut  him  off  from  that 
dominant  race  which  contributed  fifteen- 
sixteenths  to  his  physical,  and  sixteen-six- 
teenths  to  his  mental  and  spiritual  entity, 
yet  such  was  the  case.  Inexorable  custom, 
more  rigid  than  the  ancient  Median  law, 
[108] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

had  passed  its  decree.  He  took  up  his 
cross,  a  heavier  cross  perhaps  than  that  the 
Cyrenian  —  was  he,  too,  a  black  man?  — 
had  carried  after  our  Saviour,  and  fol 
lowed  after  his  Master  uncomplainingly. 

There  was  a  great  meeting  in  the  Acad 
emy  of  Music  under  the  auspices  of  the 
Colored  League,  an  Episcopal  Church  or 
ganization  for  the  advancement  of  the  con 
dition  of  the  negro,  a  few  nights  after  the 
engagement  between  Alicia  and  Whyot, 
which  was  to  be  addressed  by  the  most 
eminent  member  of  the  colored  race  in 
America,  the  famous  principal  of  the  Tal- 
ladega  Institute;  by  the  manager  of  one  of 
the  great  railroad  systems  of  the  country, 
who  was  deeply  concerned  in  the  problem; 
by  the  head  of  one  of  the  largest  merchan 
dising  concerns  in  America,  where,  by  the 
way,  no  negroes  of  whatever  character  or 
ability  could  secure  employment,  save  in 
some  menial  capacity ;  and  by  the  Reverend 
Henry  Olney. 

Alicia  was  there  of  course,  so  was  Why- 
[  109  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

ot.  Where  Alicia  was  there  was  he  also. 
He  was  trying  his  best  to  see  things  from 
her  point  of  view,  and  with  fair  success. 
It  is  easy  to  see  things  from  the  viewpoint 
of  the  woman  with  whom  you  are  in  love, 
especially  if  that  woman  happens  to  be  as 
beautiful  as  you  think  she  is,  and  you  are 
as  wise  as  she  thinks  you.  Deep  down  in 
Whyot's  heart  was  the  old  repugnance  to 
the  negro  against  which  he  had  always 
fought.  The  friendship  between  him  and 
Olney,  for  he  was  the  class-mate  to  whom 
reference  has  been  made,  was  genuine  and 
sincere.  Yet  he  never  would  have  dreamed 
of  inviting  him  to  dinner  as  he  would 
others  of  his  college-mates.  The  clergy 
man  had  conquered  the  other  man's  liking, 
but  Whyot  argued  with  himself  that  the 
man  was  practically  white  in  any  event.  In 
that  fate  had  allotted  him  the  most  un 
fortunate  social  position  to  occupy  that  she 
had  to  dispense,  the  young  physician  deeply 
pitied  his  unfortunate  friend. 

The    meeting    was    an    entire    success, 
[no] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

that  is,  if  a  great  congregation,  brilliant 
speeches,  beautiful  music,  and  fervid  pray 
ers  are  the  elements  that  go  to  make  up 
a  success.  There  were  other  things  of 
course,  there  would  be  results  of  some  sort 
possibly,  but  time  only  would  show  wheth 
er  anything  permanent  would  be  gained. 
Vox  et  pr<eterea  nihil  was  the  usual  result 
of  missionary  or  other  public  meetings  of 
this  kind  in  the  Academy  of  Music.  Every 
once  in  a  while  the  reformers  engaged  it, 
assembled  a  crowd,  which  called  itself  a 
town  meeting,  hurled  defiance  at  Chalden 
and  his  henchmen,  passed  resolutions,  ap 
pointed  committees,  and  with  vast  enthusi 
asm  —  adjourned.  Nobody  minded.  The 
people  went  away  and  forgot.  The  moun 
tain  labored  and  brought  forth  nothing, 
"  not  even  a  mouse !  " 

As  a  rule  the  speeches  that  evening  were 
all  good,  if  not  exactly  palatable.  The 
eminent  educator,  whose  remarks  were  fe 
licitous  to  a  wonderful  degree,  opened  the 
meeting  by  telling  a  story  of  a  certain  visit 
[in] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

he  had  paid  to  the  humble  home  of  one  of 
his  people  in  the  far  South.  Coffee  was 
duly  prepared,  and  when  it  was  served  his 
black  hostess  asked  his  companion  whether 
he  would  like  "  hard  sweetenin'  er  saft." 
Unfamiliar  with  the  terminology,  the  com 
panion  chose  "  saft  sweetenin',"  whereupon 
the  ancient  dame  stuck  her  black  finger  into 
the  molasses  jug,  twisted  up  a  large  mass 
of  the  sticky  compound,  and  with  her  other 
hand  scraped  it  off  into  the  coffee-cup ! 
With  this  experience  before  him  the  dis 
tinguished  educator  selected  the  alterna 
tive.  He  asked  for  "  hard  sweetenin',"  at 
that  the  old  woman  bit  off  a  huge  piece  from 
a  large  lump  of  brown  sugar  and  deposited 
it  in  his  cup !  The  moral  of  the  story,  the 
application  of  it,  was  that  whatever  the 
audience  got  that  night  was  bound  to  be 
disagreeable  to  somebody.  After  that  he 
went  on  with  his  speech. 

The  propositions  he  advocated  and  the 
conclusions  at  which  he  arrived  might  be 
disagreeable  to  a  majority  of  the  congre- 

[112] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

gation,  but  there  was  no  question  as  to 
their  sympathy  with  the  manner  and  meth 
od  of  the  speaker.  Such  apposite  illustra 
tions,  such  humorous  comparisons,  such 
ingenious  arguments,  such  shrewd  applica 
tions,  and  such  exceedingly  good  stories, 
had  rarely  been  heard  by  such  an  assem 
blage.  The  man  won  his  auditors  com 
pletely  in  the  end,  and  it  was  easy  to  see 
that  his  success  was  the  result,  not  of  a 
fortuitous  concurrence  of  circumstances, 
but  of  native  ability  of  a  rare  and  unusual 
character.  Due  to  his  white  blood  — 
fairly  or  unfairly  urged  his  critics. 

The  two  white  men  followed  him  —  at 
some  distance,  be  it  said.  They  were  both 
good,  forceful  speakers,  but  they  lacked 
the  forensic  capacity,  the  oratorical  brill 
iancy,  and  the  native  shrewdness  and  wit 
of  the  other  man.  The  theme  of  each 
man  was  the  regeneration  of  the  negro  by 
practical  education,  with  a  great  insistence 
upon  manual  training.  The  social  ques 
tion  was  touched  on  but  lightly,  and  the 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

two  white  men  did  not  even  mention  it. 
The  first  speaker,  and  he  was  in  face  and 
voice  and  manner  unmistakably  of  the 
negro  type,  for  all  his  white  blood,  had 
said,  incidentally,  that  when  the  negro 
had  proved  himself  worthy,  social  recog 
nition  would  follow.  Meanwhile  the 
question  was  academic  and  not  under  dis 
cussion. 

As  it  was  academic,  the  unthinking  por 
tion  of  the  audience  did  not  pay  much  at 
tention  to  the  remark,  although  here  and 
there  one  keener  than  the  rest  noticed  the 
statement  and  resented  it,  for,  talk  as  they 
might,  there  existed  in  that  audience,  as 
there  would  exist  in  any  other  body  of 
white  people  in  almost  any  section  of  our 
country,  an  inextinguishable,  ineradicable 
consciousness  of  domination.  They  never 
would,  under  any  circumstances,  or  at  any 
time,  be  willing  to  extend  social  recogni 
tion  to  the  negro.  To  break  down  that 
prejudice  would  be  real  national  suicide,  as 
to  maintain  it  is  to  preserve  the  purity  of 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

the  race.  With  a  complete  realization  of 
that  prejudice — for  he  was  white  enough, 
singular  contradiction!  to  feel  it — the 
Reverend  Henry  Olney  rose  to  close  the 
meeting. 

Without  hesitation  or  circumlocution  he 
announced,  what  to  many  in  that  great  au 
dience  must  have  been  news,  his  connection 
with  the  black  race.  Indeed,  to  those  who 
did  not  know  him  such  an  announcement 
was  necessary.  As  he  stood  there  in  the 
conventional  black  of  the  clergy,  his  pale, 
intellectual  face  flushed  with  the  conscious 
ness  of  the  position  he  occupied,  he  pleaded 
for  the  uplifting  of  the  great  black  mass 
which  is  down  below;  the  ignorant,  half- 
civilized  people  which  has  been  brought  in 
contact  in  an  instant,  as  it  were,  with  a 
civilization  acquired  through  centuries  of 
difficulties;  the  dull,  unreceptive,  super 
stitious  slave-holden  negro,  so  fondly  and 
fatuously  dowered  with  the  highest  gift  of 
modern  citizenship  in  a  day;  and  expected 
to  learn  the  use  in  an  hour  of  the  things 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

which  it  had  taken  the  most  brilliant  race 
the  sun  ever  shone  upon  centuries  to  mas 
ter.  And  he  appealed  for  help  for  this 
great,  constantly  growing,  submerged  body 
of  ignorance,  incompetency,  and  degrada 
tion,  the  lowest  class  of  the  most  pitiable 
people  on  the  face  of  the  globe. 

Unconsciously,  without  premeditation  — 
indeed,  he  had  intended  to  avoid  any  such 
reference  —  he  enlarged  his  plea.  Grad 
ually  his  thoughts  changed,  he  rose  above 
the  dark  strata,  and  stood  forth  the  repre 
sentative  of  another  class,  a  higher,  of 
which  he  was  by  no  means  a  single  in 
stance,  the  men  of  mixed  blood !  —  the 
people  who  were  in  varying  degrees  prac 
tically  white.  He  painted  the  helplessness 
and  hopelessness  of  their  condition  with 
such  fervor  and  force  and  eloquence  as 
fairly  swept  the  audience  off  its  feet.  They 
forgot  that  he  was  a  negro.  They  forgot 
that  to  admit  the  claim  of  one  man,  of 
whatever  the  degree  of  black  blood,  was 
to  admit  the  claim  of  all.  The  hearts  of 
[116] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 


the  people  went  out  to  him,  and  when  the 
offering  for  the  work  was  taken  up  they 
showed  that  where  their  hearts  were  there 
went  their  treasure  also. 

The  man  sat  down  after  a  terrible  ar 
raignment  of  society  for  its  arbitrary  and 
unreasoning  barriers,  after  an  awful  con 
trast  between  the  dictates  of  humanity  and 
the  plans  of  God. 

"  Rich  and  poor,"  he  cried  at  last,  his 
voice  ringing  the  ancient  phrases  through 
that  great  hall,  "  the  black  and  the  white, 
the  brown  and  the  red,  the  Lord,  He  is  the 
maker  of  them  all.  There  shall  be  a  coun 
try  where  there  is  neither  Greek  nor  Jew, 
circumcision  nor  uncircumcision,  barbarian, 
Scythian,  bond  nor  free;  but  Christ  is  all, 
and  in  all." 

So,  with  such  burning,  fiery  eloquence, 
might  Paul  himself  have  spoken. 

And  that  was  the  first  time  Alicia  saw 

the  Reverend  Henry  Olney.    As  they  stood 

on  the   steps  of  the  North   Broad  Street 

house  that  night  Doctor  Whyot  and  Alicia 

[117] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

discussed,  as  they  had  ever  since  the  meet 
ing,  the  wonderful  speech  with  which  Olney 
had  closed  it. 

"Don't  you  pity  the  negro?"  asked 
Alicia.  "  Don't  you  realize  the  truth  of 
all  that  Mr.  Olney  has  said?  Oh,  Will, 
I  don't  know  why  you  cannot  see  as  I  do ! 
They  are  human  beings,  they  have  souls, 
God  made  them.  Why  should  we  object 
to  them  merely  because  of  the  accident  of 
color?  Because  their  skins  are  darker  than 
ours?  What  has  the  color  of  a  man's  skin 
to  do  with  the  color  of  his  soul?  Aren't 
all  souls  white  in  the  sight  of  God?  How 
dare  we  discriminate?  " 

"  I  don't  know  why,  but  we  do  discrim 
inate,"  answered  Whyot  stubbornly;  "  you 
do  yourself,  Alicia." 

"  I  do  not." 

'  Yes,  you  do,  and  it  is  easy  to  prove  it." 

"How?" 

''  Would  you  marry  a  black  man, 
Alicia?" 

"  Of  course  not!  "  with  a  little  sudden 
[118] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

movement  of  repulsion  she  sought  vainly 
to  conceal. 

"There  you  are!  How  would  it  be 
possible  to  extend  social  recognition  with 
out  marriage?  That  is  the  supreme  and 
final  test  of  social  equality,  intermarriage, 
the  other  things  amount  to  nothing." 

"  But  I  would  not  marry  an  Indian,  or 
any  but  a  member  of  my  own  race." 

"  Certainly  not,  but  it's  different  with 
the  negro;  I  feel  it,  you  feel  it.  Are  you 
not  conscious  that  our  race  is  the  dominant 
one?" 

"  Yes,  it  has  become  so;  but  what  it  has 
become  the  black  race  may." 

"  Never !  "  said  Whyot  firmly.  "  I  feel 
sorry  for  them,  of  course.  I  want  to  help 
them,  and  I  want  to  help  you ;  but  frankly, 
I  cannot  forget  the  conclusion  forced  upon 
me  as  to  the  essential  superiority  of  the 
white  race.  Why,  you  yourself  argue  it 
to  me  by  merely  being  in  existence.  What 
ever  may  have  been  the  Divine  plan  origi 
nally,  at  least  they  have  become  an  in- 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

ferior  race.  Their  development  has  been 
arrested.  I  speak  from  a  scientific  stand 
point.  Perhaps  one  of  the  primeval  septs 
was  turned  aside,  climatic  or  other  condi 
tions  laid  a  hand  upon  its  descendants,  and 
said,  '  thus  far  and  no  farther.'  ' 

"  But  look  at  the  men  of  talent  among 
the  colored  people." 

"  You  can  count  them  upon  your  fin 
gers,"  answered  Doctor  Whyot;  "  and 
those  who  have  discovered  any  special  apti 
tude  at  all  have  the  white  man's  blood  in 
them.  That  Talladega  superintendent,  for 
instance,  and  as  for  the  man  who  outshone 
them  all,  Olney,  and  he  is  a  man,"  added 
the  doctor,  "  he  is  practically  entirely  white. 
Him,  now,  I  profoundly  pity.  Why  should 
one-sixteenth  of  black  blood  utterly  elimi 
nate  him  from  the  race  to  which  he  legiti 
mately  belongs?  It  is  rank  injustice,  but 
the  fact  exists.  He  is  the  loneliest  of  white 
men.  In  spite  of  himself,  the  man  looks 
down  upon  the  negro;  in  spite  of  them 
selves,  the  white  people  look  down  upon 

[   120] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

him.  He  can  look  forward  to  nothing  but 
a  life  of  service.  He  is  a  slave  to  that  one- 
sixteenth  of  black  blood.  It  is  an  eternal 
fetter  laid  upon  him,  and  he  is  one  of  the 
best,  the  noblest  fellows  that  ever  lived,  a 
gentleman,  and  I  am  proud  to  consider  him 
my  friend.  Yes,  I  pity  him  with  all  my 
heart." 

"  Yes,"  said  Alicia,  "  his  is  the  saddest 
case.  And  how  can  we  help  him?  " 

"  Sad,"  returned  her  lover,  "  it  is  ghast 
ly.  And  I  see  no  way  to  help  him;  but  if 
you  find  any  way  I'll  loyally  help  you, 
dear." 

"  I'll  find  a  way  to  help  him,  and  all  of 
them,  please  God,  Will,"  responded  the 
girl,  confidently. 

"  Perhaps  you  may;  I  hope  so.  Do  you 
know  what  I  thought  as  I  watched  those 
four  men  and  heard  them  to-night?  " 

"What  was  it?" 

;'  Well,  I  will  admit,  that  on  the  score 
of  intelligence,  the  two  black  men,  count 
ing  Olney  as  one  of  course,  outmatched 

[121] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


the  white  men,  and  I  will  admit  the  two 
white  men  tried  to  eliminate  from  their 
discussions  —  and  succeeded  —  anything 
which  in  the  slightest  degree  savored  of 
superiority,  and  I  will  admit,  further,  that 
the  two  black  men  strove  to  eliminate  — 
and  did  —  from  their  speeches  anything 
which  savored  of  subordination,  and  yet  as 
I  watched  them  I  was  conscious  that  there 
were  two  men  from  the  dominant  race 
talking  down  to  the  proposition,  and  two 
men  from  a  subordinate  race  talking  up. 
In  spite  of  themselves  that  is  what  they 
did,  their  separate  and  divergent  mental 
attitudes  indicated  it  plainly.  It  all  came 
to  me  as  it  came  —  if  people  will  honestly 
admit  it  —  to  everyone  in  that  room." 

"Yes,"  admitted  Alicia  reluctantly, 
"  you  are  right." 

"  Did  it  come  to  you?  " 

"  Yes  —  it  did,"  she  answered,  troub 
led,  but  honest,  "  in  spite  of  my  reason, 
my  heart,  everything,  I  must  admit  I  felt 
it.  That  is  my  weakness,  my  wickedness; 
[  122] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

I  ought  not  to  feel  that  way.  I  know  that 
it  is  wrong.  Yet  we  seem  the  master  race. 
Ah,  Will,  and  you  are  the  master  of  the 
master  race,  too." 

He  bent  down  toward  her. 

"  But  you  will  help  me,  won't  you?  I 
will,  I  must,  try  to  solve  this  problem. 
There  is  a  way,  I  want  to  find  it.  You 
will  help  me?  " 

"  I  will,"  he  answered,  "  in  everything, 
with  all  my  soul." 

"  God  bless  you,  and  good-night." 

Alicia's  lips  melted  upon  his  own,  and 
she  was  gone. 

There  was  that  in  her  kisses  which  never 
satisfied.  Each  one  was  an  inspiration. 
She  never  made  herself  cheap  to  her  lover. 
There  was  always  something  in  reserve. 
Whyot  stood  in  the  still  night  trembling 
from  the  brief  yet  burning  touch.  The 
girl  was  an  angel  and  a  saint.  She  was  at 
the  same  time  passionate  and  holy.  She 
appealed  to  every  side  of  him. 

In  one  of  the  many  discussions  they  had 
[  123  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

had  he  had  told  her  what  a  woman  ought 
to  be  to  a  man. 

"  A  man,"  he  had  said,  "  is  many  sided, 
if  he  be  worth  anything  in  the  world.  He 
has  a  sensuous  side,  an  intellectual  side,  a 
moral  side,  a  working  side,  a  playful  side. 
The  woman  who  is  to  fill  the  measure  of 
his  heart  must  content  him  in  his  every 
mood.  She  must  appeal  to  his  senses  by 
her  beauty;  she  must  appeal  to  his  mind  by 
her  intellect;  she  must  appeal  to  his  moral 
aspirations  by  her  spirituality,  and  when 
he  wants  to  work  or  to  play,  she  must  be 
ready.  You  content  me,  Alicia.  May  I 
speak  with  due  delicacy,  and  say  that  there 
is  nothing  here,"  laying  his  hand  upon  his 
breast,  "  no  desire,  no  dream,  no  aspira 
tion,  which  I  do  not  find  realized  in  you." 

"  It  is  not  so  with  me,  Will,"  she  had 
answered,  smiling  up  at  him  from  where 
she  sat  on  a  footstool  by  his  knee. 

"  Not  so  with  you,  darling?  "  he  cried, 
with  a  fierce  pang  at  his  heart  at  the 
thought  that  he  failed  to  satisfy  her. 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


"  I  know  a  better  way  than  that,"  she 
had  whispered  softly;  "I  don't  want  you 
quite  to  content  me;  to  me  love  that  is  sat 
isfied  begins  to  die.  I  do  not  wish  you  to 
realize  my  ideal  of  you  exactly,  absolutely, 
completely.  I  do  not  wish  to  feel  that 
your  revelation  of  yourself  is  terminated, 
that  I  have  nothing  to  learn,  or  to  discover, 
since  I  know  it  all.  Dear,  I  want  to  feel, 
as  I  look  at  you,  that  there  is  something 
more,  that  I  do  not  quite  master  it  all; 
that  there  is  something  still  to  be  sought 
for,  something  that  I  may  have  the  pleas 
ure  of  finding.  You  almost  content  me ;  I 
do  not  want  you  to  do  it  quite." 

Ah,  indeed  was  Alicia  a  Doctor  of  the 
philosophy  of  love  —  and  that  is  life! 

"  My  dear,"  Whyot  had  whispered, 
after  a  little  thoughtful  silence,  "  yours  is 
the  higher,  the  nobler,  the  better  way." 

'  Yes,"  she  answered,  nestling  closer  to 
him.  "  Be  a  little  but  not  too  discontented 
with  me  for  what  I  have  said.  Let  me 
always  be  near,  very  near  to  the  full 

measure." 

L  125] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

She  had  risen  as  she  had  spoken,  and  he 
had  stooped  toward  her  and  swept  her  to 
his  breast. 

"  Near  my  heart  forever,"  he  had  cried, 
and  with  that,  as  this  night,  she  had  kissed 
him  and  had  gone. 

He  thought  of  that  conversation  there 
with  her  good-night  kiss  upon  his  lips  as 
he  dimissed  the  coupe  and  walked  down 
the  long,  lonely,  brightly  lighted  streets 
toward  his  home. 

There  was  a  mystery  about  the  girl,  an 
elusiveness.  He  never  quite  fathomed  her. 
As  he  progressed  further  and  further  in 
her  affection,  in  her  confidence,  in  her 
being,  there  was  always  a  brighter  vista 
opened  before  him.  Ah,  yes,  to  be  a  little 
discontented,  in  the  sense  in  which  she  used 
it,  that  was  best,  in  love  and  in  life.  Alicia 
was  right.  She  was  always  right — dear 
Doctor  of  Philosophy. 

Why  hadn't  she  given  him  two  kisses 
that  night  instead  of  one? 

[126] 


VII 

THE  great  result  of  the  meeting  at 
the  Academy  of  Music,  from  Olney's 
point  of  view,  was  that  he  had  succeeded 
in  giving  a  practical  direction  to  Alicia 
Chalden's  enthusiasm.  He  had  an  oppor 
tunity  to  supplement  her  theory  by  his 
knowledge,  and  she  soon  became  the  prin 
cipal  source  of  assistance  for  Olney's  mis 
sion  work.  Chalden,  who  had  no  use  for 
the  negro  in  any  other  capacity  than  that 
of  a  servant  —  as  a  "  nigger  "  he  would 
have  phrased  it  —  watched  her  endeavors 
with  some  amusement,  mixed  with  not  a 
little  contempt. 

He  had  means  enough  to  enable  her  to 
indulge  her  whim,  her  fad,  so  he  charac 
terized  it,  to  her  heart's  content.  Alicia, 
ignorant  of  the  world,  with  but  a  vague 
idea  of  money  or  its  value,  and  with  no 
conception  of  the  vastness  of  her  father's 
[  127] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

financial  resources,  made  no  heavy  de 
mands  upon  his  treasury.  The  sums  that 
seemed  so  large  to  her  were  trifling  to 
him.  He  never  missed  them,  and  if  he 
had  would  still  have  given  her  unlimited 
range  gladly. 

Olney  was  keen  enough  to  see  how  the 
land  lay,  but  he  was  too  honorable  a  man 
to  take  advantage  of  her  inexperience,  and 
beside  that,  he  was  in  love  with  her.  In 
love  with  her  with  a  full  realization  of 
the  entire  hopelessness  of  his  position.  In 
love  with  her,  with  an  iron  determination 
never  by  word,  look,  or  gesture  to  betray 
his  passion  to  her  or  to  anyone. 

His  manner  toward  her  was  perfect. 
In  no  way  did  he  give  her  the  slightest 
tangible  clew  to  the  feelings  with  which  he 
regarded  her;  yet,  without  being  positively 
aware  of  it,  without  stating  the  fact  baldly 
to  herself,  Alicia  had  some  instinctive  in 
tuitive  feminine  perception  of  the  way  in 
which  Olney  regarded  her.  She  felt  it  in 
some  degree  at  least.  If  she  had  had  any 
[128] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

actual  evidence  to  go  upon,  doubtless  there 
would  have  been  an  instant  repulsion,  but 
the  whole  affair  was  so  subtle  that  she  felt 
nothing  but  pity  for  the  man. 

He  never  presumed  socially  upon  her 
generous  enthusiasm  for  his  race.  He 
came  often  to  the  North  Broad  Street 
house,  but  always  upon  legitimate  business 
with  meet  subjects  for  her  deliberation. 
When  he  finished  his  business  he  went 
away.  Indeed,  in  the  shortness  of  his  vis 
its  lay  his  safeguard.  He  could  only  con 
trol  himself  for  a  limited  time,  the  strain 
was  too  great.  Some  day  he  felt  the  ten 
sion  would  be  too  much  for  him.  Then, 
God  help  him,  he  would  break.  Mean 
time,  he  would  not  see  her  except  it  were 
necessary.  He  ought  not  to  have  seen  her 
at  all  after  he  recognized  his  feeling  for 
her,  but  then  there  was  the  mission,  and 
what  she  could  do  for  it.  His  duty,  and 
his  desire,  ran  parallel  —  a  rare  occur 
rence,  for  these  things  nearly  always  cross 
at  right  angles. 

[  I29  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

Alicia  had  dragged  Whyot  to  the  mis 
sion  in  her  train.  The  college  acquaint 
ance  between  the  two  men  had  been  re 
sumed,  and  the  doctor  lent  what  assistance 
—  mainly  medical  —  he  could  to  the  other 
man's  work.  He  had  not  the  slightest 
suspicion  of  the  feeling  Olney  entertained 
for  Alicia.  The  suggestion  of  such  a  thing 
would  have  seemed  to  him  preposterous  — 
as  indeed  it  was  —  an  insult  —  which  it 
certainly  was  not.  In  fact  no  one  sus 
pected  it  except  the  girl,  and  her  con 
sciousness  was  not  sufficiently  acute  for 
her  to  feel  affronted  —  not  yet.  The  hap 
piness  and  satisfaction  she  took  in  her  own 
love  affair,  the  completeness  of  her  self- 
surrender  to  her  lover,  and  the  entirety  of 
his  devotion  to  her,  moved  her  the  more  to 
a  tender  pity  for  the  poor  clergyman  and 
his  hopeless  passion. 

As  for  Olney,  he  raged  against  the  situa 
tion  in  which  he  found  himself  involved. 
Practically  as  well  born,  in  one  sense,  as 
Whyot,  though  out  of  wedlock,  for  the 

[  130] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


white  blood  in  him  came  from  a  mixture 
of  some  of  the  best  strains  of  the  oldest 
and  most  aristocratic  portion  of  Virginia; 
as  bright  a  student,  as  well  educated  a  man 
as  the  doctor,  with  a  mind  keener  and  more 
subtle,  with  manners  even  more  polished, 
for  greater  necessity  for  circumspection 
existed  in  his  case  than  was  required  of  one 
whose  position  in  society  was  so  assured; 
with  a  profession  which  was  second  to 
none  in  dignity,  honor,  and  unselfishness; 
and  with  a  consciousness  of  ability  to 
achieve,  he  could  not  see  why  that  little 
infiltration  of  black  blood  should  remove 
him  so  entirely  from  the  possibility  of 
seeking  the  desire  of  his  heart. 

Why,  in  God's  name,  wasn't  he  as  capa 
ble,  as  fit  a  husband  for  Alicia  Chalden  as 
any  other  man  on  earth?  No  man  was  fit 
for  her  of  course.  That  admission  was 
an  evidence  of  the  genuineness  of  his  pas 
sion,  but  at  least  there  was  no  real  reason 
save  that  damned  streak,  with  its  inevita 
ble  implication  of  oft  repeated  illegitimacy 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

back  in  the  line,  which  differentiated  him 
from  the  rest  of  the  world.  God!  if  he 
had  only  been  a  black  man,  he  would  have 
gloried  in  his  color.  But  to  be  neither  one 
nor  the  other,  to  be  set  far  above  the  black 
man  on  the  one  hand,  and  far  below  the 
white  man  on  the  other;  to  have  all  the 
ambitions,  aspirations,  desires,  and  capaci 
ties  of  the  white  man,  and  yet  to  be  denied 
all  participation  or  fellowship  with  him, 
and  to  be  forced  to  turn  for  all  that  makes 
life  dear  to  the  black  race,  or  to  another, 
if  he  could  find  one,  in  a  situation  like  unto 
his  own,  and  thus  unite  two  discontents 
into  a  mighty  river  of  despair — it  was  im 
possible  ! 

The  faith,  the  belief,  the  religion  of  the 
Reverend  Henry  Olney  trembled  in  the 
passionate  vortices  in  which  his  soul  was 
caught  and  tossed.  He  prayed,  he  ago 
nized,  he  threw  himself  with  redoubled 
energy  into  his  work.  He  forced  himself 
to  see  the  girl  with  the  outward  calmness, 
the  indifference  of  a  stranger.  He  steeled 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

his  heart  against  the  influence  she  exerted, 
he  mocked  and  despised  himself  for  giving 
way  to  a  passion  in  which  in  his  secret  hours 
he  gloried  —  and  in  vain.  He  succeeded 
in  but  one  thing.  He  loved  the  girl  with 
the  tropic  intensity  of  the  South,  yet  amid 
the  inward  conflict  he  gave  no  outward 
sign.  Not  even  Philip  Chalden,  with  his 
keen  vision,  could  have  detected  it.  Only 
Alicia  had  that  dim  idea  of  it  which  she 
pityingly  put  out  of  sight. 

There  lived  in  Chalden's  household  an 
old  black  woman,  who  had  been  Philip 
Chalden's  nurse  and  in  turn  Alicia's.  Aunt 
Nancy  was  a  member  of  Olney's  congrega 
tion.  She  had  grown  to  love  the  young 
man  as  if  he  had  been  her  own  son,  and 
he,  respecting  her  sterling  integrity,  her 
shrewd  common  sense  and  kindness  of 
heart,  repaid  her  with  kindly  and  affection 
ate  consideration.  She  was  almost  bed 
ridden  now,  and  he  came  often  to  see  her. 
Time  was  when  Philip  Chalden  had  stood 
[  133] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

highest  in  her  heart,  but  the  cares  of  the 
world  in  which  he  lived  had  gradually  en 
grossed  the  man.  He  had  lost  the  finer 
feelings,  and  though  he  still  treated  his  old 
"  mammy  "  with  careless  kindness  and  in 
dulged  her  every  material  wish,  he  came 
less  and  less  often  to  see  her.  She  simply 
drifted  out  of  his  life. 

There  is  a  weak  spot  in  every  man's  ar 
mor,  one  point  at  least  in  which  the  other 
wise  invulnerable  may  be  fatally  stricken; 
and  the  secret  of  success  for  the  enemy  is  to 
find  the  point.  It  was  a  petty  stab  in  the 
heel  that  laid  mighty  Achilles  low. 

This  woman  knew  all  about  Chalden's 
mysterious  past,  of  course;  but  when  he 
thought  about  it  at  all  he  remembered  that 
she  had  known  it  all  the  time  and  she  had 
never  spoken  of  it.  She  would  never  speak 
of  it.  His  was  the  confidence  of  custom, 
begot  by  the  habit  of  old  assurance.  He 
had  cautioned  her  enough  at  first,  but  of 
late  years  the  subject  had  not  even  been 
mentioned  between  them. 

[134] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

If  he  had  considered  it,  it  is  probable, 
nay,  certain,  that  he  would  have  reasoned 
that  self-interest,  if  no  other  motive  were 
potent,  would  keep  her  silent.  What!  If 
loyalty  were  gone,  would  she  venture  to 
strike  at  the  hand  that  fed  her,  clothed  her, 
sheltered  her?  Would  she  open  her  lips 
when  to  tell  meant  her  beggary,  the  street 
in  her  old  age,  severance  from  Alicia — 
from  him?  So  confident  was  he  that  the 
shadow  of  a  doubt  of  her  fidelity  never  en 
tered  his  mind.  Yet  had  he  but  thought  of 
it  with  the  unbiassed  clearness  with  which 
he  was  accustomed  to  consider  eventual 
ities,  he  might  have  realized  that  there 
would  come  a  moment  when  his  material 
power,  at  least,  would  be  unavailing,  and 
that  if  no  other  force  existed  to  restrain 
her,  the  situation,  for  him,  would  be  pre 
carious  in  the  extreme.  That  would  be  the 
moment  when,  not  of  choice  but  of  neces 
sity,  she  would  be  compelled  to  exchange 
the  comforts  of  her  present  home  for  a 
narrower  and  more  lasting  abode.  What, 

[  135] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


if  just  as  she  trembled  on  that  eternal  verge, 
she  should  speak? 

Chalden  had  done  with  women  long 
since.  Like  men  of  his  calibre,  he  despised 
them  unless  they  were  bad  enough  to  be 
useful  to  him,  and  he  forgot  that  the  most 
potent  force  to  undermine  loyalty  and  kill 
devotion  is  neglect.  One  cannot  even 
scorn  a  black  woman  with  impunity,  and 
to  a  loving  heart,  especially  a  woman's, 
worse  even  than  scorn  is  indifference. 

The  old  mammy  had  loved  him  when  he 
was  a  child  and  when  he  was  a  man.  She 
had  been  loyal  and  helpful  to  him  in  all 
his  troubles,  and  had  taken  pride  in  her 
assistance  to  her  master.  In  her  old  black 
breast  she  had  buried  secrets,  the  mere  pos 
session  of  which  might  have  killed  a  less 
sturdy  woman.  She  had  been  faithful  to 
him  through  years,  but  now  a  change  had 
come  over  the  spirit  of  her  dreams.  She 
had  been  left  alone  too  much. 

We  have  it  from  the  Highest  Authority 
that  it  is  not  good  for  man  to  be  alone,  and 
[136] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

it  may  not  be  gainsaid  that  solitude  is  even 
worse  for  a  woman,  especially  a  woman  of 
Aunt  Nancy's  class,  to  whom  attention,  be 
it  only  that  we  might  bestow  upon  a  dog, 
is  as  the  breath  of  life.  Chalden's  own 
action  had  wrought  a  miracle.  He  had 
shaken  the  fidelity  of  an  ancient  slave. 
Into  the  place  which  his  own  withdrawal 
had  left  vacant  had  crept  the  personality 
of  another  man;  the  more  easily,  because, 
like  many  full-blooded  negroes,  Aunt 
Nancy  was  proud  to  claim  the  brilliant 
Olney  as  one  of  her  own  unfortunate 
race. 

The  ground  was  undermined  beneath 
Philip  Chalden's  feet  by  his  own  actions. 
There  was  brewing  for  him  a  petard  which, 
in  the  end,  was  to  hoist  the  engineer. 
Jealousy,  the  bitter  pangs  of  old  relation 
ship  slowly  sundered,  of  benefits  forgot  — 
benefits  that  she  had  conferred  upon  him  — 
filled  that  old  storm-torn  heart.  Slowly 
these  had  swept  out  the  image  of  Chalden 
and  that  of  Olney  had  entered  in. 
[  137] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


It  is  true  that  Alicia  had  her  place  in  the 
woman's  heart,  too;  but  it  was  never  the 
place  that  Chalden  had  held,  nor  was  it 
that  which  Olney  began  to  occupy.  Alicia 
had  been  separated  from  her  old  nurse  for 
so  many  years  that  she  had  grown  some 
what  apart  from  her.  Without  in  the  least 
intending  it,  for  she  had  too  gentle  a  heart 
to  neglect  the  old  woman  or  hurt  her  feel 
ings  in  any  way,  the  girl,  on  her  return 
home,  did  not  quite  resume  the  old  place 
or  enter  again  upon  the  relationship  which 
Aunt  Nancy  fancied  should  subsist  between 
them.  Truth  to  tell,  Alicia  was  more  in 
terested  in  the  general  proposition  with  re 
lation  to  the  negro  race  to  which  she  had 
engaged  herself,  than  in  any  particular  in 
dividual,  even  old  Aunt  Nancy  —  that  is 
the  mistake  of  most  social  reformers,  they 
shrink  from  the  personal  application  of 
their  theories! 

So,  since  the  love  the  old  woman  had 
borne  Philip  Chalden  could  not  restrain 
Aunt  Nancy,  the  less  affection  she  had  for 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

his  daughter  proved  no  bar.  She  hesi 
tated  and  Chalden  was  lost. 

Often  when  Olney  was  with  his  humble 
parishioner,  Alicia  came  to  the  sunny 
chamber  which  was  now  Aunt  Nancy's 
world.  The  aged  woman's  affection  for 
the  preacher  enabled  her  to  divine  some 
thing  of  what  was  going  on  in  the  man's 
heart.  There  are  few  secrets  a  man  can 
keep  from  a  loving  woman,  be  she  wife, 
or  mother,  or  friend,  and  Aunt  Nancy 
knew  that  Olney  loved  Alicia. 

The  fact  roused  in  the  old  woman 
strange  and  impossible  dreams.  Strange 
feelings  tore  her  bosom,  strange  revela 
tions  trembled  on  her  lips.  Alone  most  of 
the  day.  she  brooded  and  brooded. 

On  her  death-bed  she  called  the  preacher 
to  her  and  made  him  a  marvellous  con 
fession.  With  her  dying  hands  she  pressed 
into  his  palm  a  packet  of  old,  time-faded 
papers.  The  man  went  gray  as  he  bent 
his  head  to  hear  what  the  old  woman  had 
to  tell.  After  she  died  under  his  own  ab- 
[  139] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

solution,  with  the  packet  tightly  clasped  in 
his  own  hand,  he  staggered  out  of  the 
house,  and,  not  daring  to  trust  himself  on 
foot  in  the  street,  called  a  cab  and  was 
driven  to  his  own  study,  his  mind  reeling 
as  if  he  had  had  a  stroke.  He  was  appalled 
at  the  revelation  the  old  woman  had  made. 
But  for  the  confirming  evidence  in  his  hand 
he  would  have  disregarded  it  as  the  foolish 
dream  of  a  fatuous  old  dotard. 

That  night,  as  she  had  insisted  and  as  he 
had  promised,  he  had  an  interview  with 
Philip  Chalden.  The  financier  listened  to 
him  at  first  with  indifference,  soon  suc 
ceeded  by  amazement,  rage,  and  terror. 
When  Olney  left  the  house  an  hour  after,  he 
had  refused  wealth  beyond  the  dreams  of 
avarice.  He  had  given  his  word  of  honor 
to  keep  a  secret,  the  keeping  of  which  broke 
his  heart;  and  yet  there  was  a  strange  ex 
altation  in  his  soul,  the  exaltation  which 
comes  alone  from  the  sacrifice  of  self, 
which  almost  compensated  him  for  what 
he  had  done.  And  there  was  one  man  in 
[  140] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

that  great  city  in  which  Olney  worked  and 
labored  who  knew  him,  negro  though  he 
might  be,  for  a  man  and  a  master. 

Everybody  recognized  that  there  was 
something  mysterious  about  Chalden.  He 
refused  persistently  to  discuss  his  early 
life.  No  one  knew  anything  about  his 
place  of  birth  or  his  young  manhood.  He 
had  suddenly  appeared  in  Philadelphia, 
attended  only  by  the  baby  Alicia  and 
the  old  black  woman.  Without  vouch 
safing  explanation  of  any  sort  he  had 
made  his  upward  way,  climbed  to  his  own 
place.  The  keenest  and  cleverest  question 
ing  had  never  betrayed  him  into  commit 
ting  himself  in  the  slightest  degree.  There 
were  many  men  who  would  have  given 
much  to  discover  his  early  history,  for 
they  were  persuaded  his  silence  concealed 
something  which  it  would  be  highly  advan 
tageous  to  his  many  enemies  to  know. 
Now  Olney  knew  it,  and  his  pledged  honor 
made  of  him,  constructively  at  least,  Chal- 
den's  friend.  Yet  Chalden  hated  him. 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


It  had  been  many  years  after  Chalden 
came  to  Philadelphia  before  he  rose  to 
prominence,  and,  try  as  they  could,  and 
some  of  the  best  detectives  in  the  country 
had  been  covertly  employed  to  solve  the 
mystery,  they  found  nothing.  Olney  had 
solved  it  in  part,  the  most  bitter  part.  He 
would  not  have  been  human  had  he  not  felt 
elated.  It  is  not  so  much  the  use,  the  em 
ployment  of  power,  as  the  possession  of  it 
that  satisfies  some  men.  Philip  Chalden 
was  in  Olney's  power,  and  Olney,  who 
could  not  be  bribed  or  frightened,  had 
voluntarily  promised  to  stay  his  hand.  But 
Olney  had  done  wrong  —  at  least  he  was 
doubtful,  and  with  a  man  of  Olney's  tem 
perament  there  was  condemnation  in  the 
doubt.  A  slighted  conscience  tempered 
pride,  alloyed  sacrifice,  weakened  power, 
and  added  its  pangs  to  those  of  love, 
unrequited  and  hopeless  —  yet  it  was  for 
Alicia  that  he  had  promised  what  he 
had. 

As    for   Chalden,   the   whole    situation, 

L  142  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

and  more  than  all  his  impotence  in  it,  shook 
him  to  the  very  soul.  Face  to  face  with 
a  man  who  knew  what  he  had  set  his  whole 
mind  and  soul  upon  concealing  and  forget 
ting,  a  man  who  could  neither  be  bought 
nor  broken,  neither  awed  nor  coerced  —  he 
would  have  killed  him  if  occasion  had 
served. 

Late  the  night  of  his  interview  with  the 
clergyman  Chalden  made  his  way  upstairs 
to  the  chamber  of  his  old  mammy.  He 
looked  down  upon  her  dead  body,  decently 
laid  out  for  burial,  with  the  malevolent 
gaze  of  a  baffled  autocrat,  a  checked  con 
queror.  Yet  long  ago  he  had  lain  in  her 
arms,  she  had  loved  him.  He  would  have 
staked  his  life  on  her  fidelity,  but  she  had 
proved  false  to  him.  Why  he  had  retained 
that  confidence  in  her  was  suddenly  become 
a  mystery  to  him  —  perhaps  because  she  was 
only  a  black  woman,  he  thought.  He  had 
been  for  once  in  his  life  a  fool.  Once  was 
enough. 

Fie    had    juggled    with    honor,    man's 

[  143  1 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

honor,  as  he  had  juggled  with  stocks. 
Everything  with  him  had  been  simply  a 
question  of  dollars  and  cents.  It  was  all 
a  matter  of  price.  The  only  question 
worth  bothering  about  was  "  how  much?  " 
The  same  hour  in  which  the  old  woman, 
by  betraying  him  for  what  price  he  knew 
not,  had  confirmed  his  theory,  the  young 
man,  by  volunteering  to  keep  his  secret 
without  money  and  without  price,  had 
broken  it  down;  yet  only  in  part. 

Chalden  knew  men  and  women.  At 
least  he  knew  the  baser  side  of  the  race  he 
mastered  and  despised.  He  did  not  be 
lieve  that  it  was  in  any  human  heart  to  keep 
such  a  secret  as  the  clergyman  possessed. 
There  was  one  passion  of  which  he  had 
known  little  for  twenty  years.  If  it  had 
been  explained  to  him  again  he  might  have 
been  enlightened.  It  was  not  consideration 
for  Chalden  that  would  keep  Olney  silent, 
but  love  for  Alicia  that  would  seal  his  lips. 
Chalden  had  loved  once  in  his  life,  and  his 
affection  had  been  basely  betrayed.  There- 


A   DOCTOR    OF    PHILOSOPHY 

after  he  only  hated,  and  he  viewed  as  a 
sign  of  weakness  the  showing  of  any  sort 
of  affection — except  for  Alicia.  It  rather 
alarmed  him  when  he  thought  of  the  hold 
Alicia  was  taking  upon  him. 


[H5] 


VIII 

THE  Major  passed  his  days  in  broken 
hearted  discontent.  Chalden's  accept 
ance  of  William  Penn  as  a  suitor  for  his 
daughter,  William  Penn's  determination  to 
persist  in  his  opposition  to  the  Major's  de 
sire,  all  conspired  to  make  him  most  mis 
erable.  He  had  seen  Alicia  at  church  and 
at  different  places  in  company  with  his 
nephew.  Once,  at  the  Opera,  William 
Penn,  with  Alicia  on  his  arm,  had  cornered 
him  and  he  had  been  presented  to  her. 
Her  beauty  had  impressed  him  powerfully, 
it  always  did  everyone,  and  he  thought  too 
much  of  himself  to  be  guilty  of  any  open 
rudeness  to  her,  but  he  was  greatly  relieved 
when  William  Penn  took  her  away,  and  his 
determined  opposition  was  not  weakened  a 
bit.  The  girl  knew  all  about  the  Major's 
feeling  toward  the  marriage.  Her  lover 
had  not  concealed  it,  and  she  was  grieved 
[146] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

in  that  knowledge,  but  she  had  neverthe 
less  avowed  her  willingness  to  marry  Will 
iam  Penn  in  spite  of  the  family  antagonism 
which  had  been  awakened,  trusting  to  win 
him  to  her  side  in  the  end.  Doctor 
Whyot  was  of  full  age  and  could  decide 
for  himself,  so  Alicia  sensibly  reasoned  — 
besides,  she  loved  him  too  much  to  give 
him  up. 

With  the  obstinacy  of  small  natures  the 
Major  still  refused  to  acquiesce  in  the  situ 
ation.  The  will  which  had  been  drawn  up 
in  his  anger  remained  unchanged,  and  he 
had  no  more  to  do  with  his  nephew  than 
he  could  help.  Indeed,  the  Major  began, 
with  anxiety  and  fear  be  it  said,  to  contem 
plate  matrimony  himself.  Why!  the  real 
true  Whyot  line  might  perish  from  the 
face  of  the  earth!  Either  alternative  was 
dreadful.  To  give  up  his  ease  and  be  in 
his  old  age  at  the  beck  and  call  of  a  woman 
was  frightful  for  him  to  contemplate. 
The  Major's  ideas  of  the  sphere  and  place 
of  women  were  as  low  as  Philip  Chalden's 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


ideas  of  men,  which  was  saying  a  great 
deal. 

The  old  man  passed  his  days  in  revolv 
ing  countless  fruitless  and  impracticable 
schemes  to  separate  the  lovers  and  pre 
vent  the  marriage.  On  one  occasion  he 
dreamed  of  entering  the  financial  world, 
of  taking  up  the  battle  against  Chalden,  of 
attempting  to  ruin  him !  No  consciousness 
of  inferiority  deterred  him  from  this  fatu 
ous  undertaking,  but  he  realized  that,  were 
Alicia  poor,  William  Penn's  honor  —  the 
Whyot  honor  —  would  second  his  affec 
tion  and  the  situation  would  be  more  hope 
less  than  before. 

It  became  speedily  known  in  Philadel 
phia  that  a  marriage  between  William 
Penn  Whyot  and  Alicia  Chalden  had  been 
arranged.  There  was  no  secret  made  as 
to  the  displeasure  of  the  Whyot  family 
and  their  associates,  indeed  the  Major  had 
been  outspoken  on  the  subject.  His  re 
marks  and  those  of  his  friends  who  agreed 
with  him  had  come  to  the  ears  of  Philip 
[148] 


A   DOCTOR    OF    PHILOSOPHY 

Chalden,  and  the  latter  had  determined  to 
revenge  himself  by  bringing  the  Major  to 
the  brink  of  ruin.  When  the  Major  got 
to  the  brink  if  he  behaved  himself  he 
might  be  pulled  back,  if  he  did  not  he 
would  be  shoved  over.  Chalden  would 
thus  deter  any  of  the  Major's  friends  or 
acquaintances  from  further  animadversions 
upon  him.  A  word  or  two  to  his  trusted 
brokers  started  a  raid  on  a  certain  line  of 
stocks  much  affected  by  conservative  Phila- 
delphians  for  their  apparent  solidity  and 
freedom  from  fluctuation,  in  which  most 
of  the  Major's  holdings  were  involved, 
with  those  of  hundreds  of  other  people. 
Chalden  did  not  care  for  those  others;  he 
was  after  the  Major  primarily,  the  Ma 
jor's  friends  incidentally,  who  else  might 
suffer  did  not  matter  to  him.  Chalden 
didn't  appear  in  the  enterprise,  and  nei 
ther  William  Penn  Whyot  nor  the  Major 
realized  his  connection  with  the  affair. 

The  surprised  Major  woke  up  one  morn 
ing,   however,   to  find  that  he  stood  just 

L 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

where  Chalden  had  determined  he  should 
stand,  on  the  verge  of  ruin,  with  the  events 
of  the  ensuing  day  to  decide  whether  he 
should  go  back  or  over.  The  poor  little 
Major  was  no  financier.  Other  men,  car 
ing  nothing  for  the  Major,  fought  Chal 
den,  for  they  soon  realized  who  was  behind 
the  movement  that  was  bearing  down  the 
Major's  stocks,  because  they  wanted  to  hit 
Chalden  and  they  always  fought  him  what 
ever  he  did;  but  they  fought  him  unavail- 
ingly.  So  far  as  the  Major  was  concerned 
he  had  to  stand  helpless;  stop,  listen,  or 
wait,  with  what  equanimity  he  possessed, 
for  the  results.  At  this  critical  stage  in  the 
Major's  fortunes  there  came  to  him  one 
Buldon,  a  principal  operator  in  the  stock 
market,  who,  like  the  Major,  stood  to  lose 
or  win  all,  to  such  a  point  had  his  oppo 
sition  to  Chalden  brought  him  with  the 
rest. 

So  urgent  was  the  business,  such  a  crisis 
their   fortunes  were   facing,   that   Buldon, 
who  was  distantly  allied  to  the  Whyot  class 
[150] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

and  usually  transacted  their  business  for 
them,  ventured  to  call  upon  the  Major  at 
his  home  before  he  had  finished  his  break 
fast,  which  was  most  annoying,  for  the 
Major  did  not  like  to  mix  business  —  what 
he  called  business  —  with  his  meals.  Real 
ly,  Buldon  was  getting  inconsiderate ! 

Buldon  had  brought  with  him  an  un 
known  man,  unknown  to  the  Major,  that  is. 
This  person,  actuated  by  a  desire  for  re 
venge  for  certain  reasons  which  were  soon 
revealed,  after  years  of  search  claimed  to 
have  discovered  what  he  believed  to  be  the 
secret  of  Chalden's  life.  The  secret  was 
not  one  that  reflected  greatly  upon  Chal- 
den  himself.  To  have  published  it  would 
not  have  harmed  him  in  the  least  in  public 
respect.  It  involved  Alicia's  mother.  Bul 
don  had  only  the  vaguest  idea  of  what  the 
man  had  to  tell.  He  had  learned  that  the 
man  had  made  certain  investigations  alone 
and  had  become  possessed  of  certain  valu 
able  information.  With  his  secret  he  had 
come  back  to  Philadelphia,  and,  being  a 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

cunning  man,  had  quietly  investigated  the 
present  state  of  affairs  in  order  to  make 
the  best  possible  use  of  it. 

He  feared  to  go  to  Chalden  direct. 
The  power  of  the  man  was  so  tremendous, 
his  courage  was  so  well  known,  that  the 
investigator  decided  to  hold  his  secret  until 
he  could  approach  Chalden  through  some 
third  party,  so  that  he  personally  could  es 
cape  the  consequences  of  the  millionaire's 
displeasure.  And  there  were  other  reasons 
why  he  feared  to  meet  Chalden  face  to 
face.  He  preferred  to  strike  him  through 
a  third  party,  himself  unknown.  When  he 
learned  of  the  antagonism  of  the  Whyot 
family  to  the  proposed  marriage,  when  he 
discovered  the  social  position  of  Major 
Whyot  in  Philadelphia,  he  determined 
that  in  him  lay  his  opportunity.  The  raid 
on  the  Major's  stock,  which  was  now  of 
public  notoriety,  gave  him  a  further  lever 
age,  he  thought. 

There  was  an  exciting  interview  be 
tween  Bnldon  and  the  Major  that  morn- 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

ing,  the  third  man  listening  silently  to  what 
was  going  on. 

"  I  tell  you,"  said  the  former,  "  that  it 
will  mean  ruin  to  us  all.  Your  holdings  of 
the  stock  will  not  bring  five  cents  on  the 
dollar.  It  is  going  down,  and  we  can't 
stop  it.  Chalden  is  behind  it  all.  Nobody 
else  has  power  and  money  enough  to  do  it. 
That  stock  ought  to  be  as  good  as  the  Bank 
of  England.  It's  been  as  steady  as  United 
States  bonds.  Unless  we  can  put  a  brake 
on  him  we  are  ruined,  ruined,  I  say!  It 
means  that  you  and  your  friends  who  own 
most  of  the  stock  will  be  reduced  to  beg 
gary  !  You'll  have  to  go  to  work,  or 
starve.  Here  is  this  man  who  wants  to 
talk  with  you.  He  says  he  knows  some 
thing  about  Chalden  that  will  be  of  great 
service  to  us.  I  don't  know  what  it  is,  he 
hasn't  told  me.  He  won't  tell  anyone  but 
you,  because  you  have  a  deeper  interest  in 
getting  hold  of  Chalden  than  any  of  us, 
he  says,  in  downing  this  infernal  devil-fish 
who  has  us  in  his  clutches.  I  leave  him 

[153] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

with  you,  and  I  tell  you  frankly,  unless 
you  can  do  something  with  or  without  his 
information,  it's  all  up  with  us.  Good-by. 
Let  me  know  at  the  earliest  possible  mo 
ment  at  Larnard's  office  if  anything  is  to 
be  done." 

Leaving  the  other  man,  Buldon  turned 
on  his  heel  and  left  the  house  as  abruptly 
as  he  had  spoken.  The  Major  had  only 
grasped  two  or  three  points  in  this  concise 
statement.  Ruin,  beggary,  work !  They 
were  equally  distasteful.  Chalden,  whom 
he  hated,  was  at  the  back  of  it ! 

"  Well  —  er  —  Mr.  —  I  did  not  catch 
your  name,  sir,"  he  said,  turning  to  the 
shifty  looking  man  standing  impudently 
and  easily  before  him. 

"  Call  me  Jackens,  sir,  that's  as  good  a 
name  as  any." 

"  You  have  something  to  say  to  me 
which  may  be  of  service  in  this  —  er  — 
crisis,  Mr.  —  ah  —  Jackens  ?  " 

"  Yes,  sir." 

"  I'm    no   business   man.      You   should 

[154] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

have  a  talk  with  Larnard,  my  broker,  or 
Mr.  Buldon,  but " 

"  This  ain't  so  much  in  the  way  of  busi 
ness,  sir,  as  you  might  think." 

"Well,  what  is  it?" 

"  For  reasons  which  I  needn't  go  into, 
I've  been  very  much  interested  in  finding 
out  what  I  could  about  Philip  Chalden's 
early  life.  And,  by  a  singular  combination 
of  circumstances,  which  you  don't  care  to 
hear  about  now,  I've  been  able  to  trace 
him  up.  I  know  what  nobody  else  knows 
about  him,"  he  cried  triumphantly.  "  His 
proper  name  is  Avery." 

"  I  know  it,"  answered  the  Major  calm 
ly;  "  don't  shout  so." 

"The  h  — lyou  do!" 

"Sir,  sir!"  said  the  Major,  peremp 
torily,  "  I  want  you  to  understand  that  you 
are  in  a  gentleman's  private  house,  and 
such  language  as  that  from  a  —  er  —  a 
person  in  your  station  to  one  of  —  er  — 
mine  is  not  permissible." 

"  No  offence,  no  offence,  sir,"  answered 
[155] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

the  other  promptly,  concealing  his  surprise, 
"  as  between  gentlemen " 

"  Proceed,  sir,"  interrupted  the  Major 
in  the  calmest  manner,  utterly  disgusted  at 
the  effrontery  of  the  other  —  a  "gentle 
man,"  indeed! 

;'  Well,  perhaps  you  know  the  whole 
story?"  he  inquired  sneeringly. 

"  What  I  know,  and  what  I  do  not 
know,  are  no  concern  of  yours,  sir.  If 
you  have  anything  to  say,  say  it.  If  not, 
go  !  This  interview  is  becoming  —  er  — 
distasteful  to  me." 

"  Sir,  the  main  thing  I  have  found  about 
Chalden  is  that  he  was  a  young  blood  in 
St.  Louis  some  twenty-five  years  ago,  that 
his  wife  ran  away  from  him  with  another 
man.  That  he  followed  her,  shot  the  man 
dead,  and  that  the  woman  committed  sui 
cide.  That  Chalden  took  his  daughter 
and  vanished  —  gave  himself  out  for  dead. 
I  traced  him  to  Italy  and  I  traced  him  back 
here.  Now,  I  reckon  that  information  is 
worth  more  to  Chalden  than  to  anybody 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

else,  unless  it  is  to  you.  There  is  not  a 
soul  on  earth  that  knows  it,  unless  it's  me, 
and  there's  many  a  man  that  would  give 
a  pot  of  money  to  find  it  out.  There's 
newspapers,  there's  men  that  wishes  to 
down  him,  there's  yourself,  that  could 
bring  him  to  his  knees.  That  precious 
daughter  of  his  that  your  nephew  is  to 
marry  against  your  will,  how'd  he  like  to 
know  that  she  was  the  daughter  of  an 
adulteress,  a  suicide,  and  that  her  father 
killed  a  man?  Damn  him!  "  went  on  the 
other  fiercely,  revealing  the  motive  of  his 
rage.  "  I  was  a  speculator  in  a  small  way. 
He's  done  me  up,  I  was  in  his  employ 
and  he  kicked  me  out  of  it " 

Mr.  Jackens  did  not  say  that  his  dis 
charge  was  for  a  good  and  sufficient  cause. 

"  And  I  swore  I'd  get  even  with  him. 
He  ruined  hundreds  with  his  stock  market 
tricks,  curse  him,  includin'  me !  "  he  went 
on  in  a  spasm  of  virtue,  "  and  now  I've  got 
him  right  there !  " 

He  extended  his  hand  with  down-turned 
[157] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

thumb  toward  the  Major,  who  recoiled 
from  the  possible  touch  as  if  from  con 
tamination. 

The  Major  was  calm,  deadly  calm,  out 
wardly,  but  he  had  never  been  so  furiously 
angry,  so  outraged,  so  insulted,  in  his  life. 
Au  fond  the  blood  of  the  de  Vyault  was 
good  blood  still. 

'  You  wish  me  to  go  to  Mr.  Chalden 
with  this  news?  " 

"  I  do,  sir." 

"  I  suppose  you  are  not  doing  this  for 
mere  revenge?  " 

"  Lord,  no,  it's  too  expensive  for  me. 
I  want  money,  lots  of  it.  I  reckon  it  will 
take  about  a  cool  million  in  cold  cash  to 
shut  me  up." 

"  And  —  er  —  what  do  you  expect  me 
to  get  out  of  the  enterprise?"  continued 
the  old  man  in  that  suspiciously  quiet  voice. 

If  Mr.  Jackens  had  not  been  so  excited 
over  the  prospect,  being  a  man  of  great 
native  shrewdness,  he  would  have  seen  the 
storm  which  was  about  to  break. 
[158] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  Well,  you  can  get  what  you  want.  If 
I  was  you  I'd  stop  this  raid  on  your  stocks, 
and  I'd  make  him  withdraw  his  consent  to 
the  marriage  of  his  daughter  to  your 
nephew " 

"  You  hound!  "  cried  the  Major,  burst 
ing  into  furious  wrath,  "  you  infamous 
dog !  You  come  here  with  such  a  propo 
sition  to  me  after  prying  into  the  ante 
cedents  of  a  gentleman,  a  gentleman ! 
Yes,  damn  it,  sir,  and  you  ask  me  to  soil 
myself,  me  a  Whyot,  sir,  by  any  such  dirty 
underhand  business  as  blackmailing,  sir?  " 

As  he  spoke  the  little  Major  snatched  a 
riding  crop  from  the  table  in  the  library, 
where  the  conversation  had  taken  place, 
and  in  a  perfect  passion  of  fury  struck  the 
man  again  and  again  with  the  handle  of  it. 
Mr.  Jackens  was  half  as  large  again  as  the 
Major;  physically  the  latter  was  no  match 
at  all  for  him,  but  such  was  the  fury  which 
filled  the  old  man  that  the  younger  abso 
lutely  cowered  before  him. 

"  By  God,  sir !  "  he  spluttered,  vainly 
[159] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

seeking  to  protect  his  head  and  face  as 
he  shrank  back  against  the  wall  writhing 
with  pain,  blood  dropping  from  lips  and 
nose  and  gashed  cheek.  "  You'll  pay  for 
this !  He'll  pay  for  it.  I'll  wait  until  to 
morrow.  Until  he  has  ruined  you,  and 
then  I'll  ruin  him!  " 

;'  I  warn  you,"  said  the  Major,  throw 
ing  the  bloody  crop  to  the  floor  in  disgust, 
"  not  to  cross  my  path  again,  ruin  or  no 
ruin.  And  I  warn  you  further,  I  have 
some  slight  knowledge  of  Mr.  Chalden. 
I  venture  to  say  that  if  you  open  your 
mouth  concerning  him  with  any  such  story 
you  will  repent  it  to  your  dying  day. 
Cato,"  he  continued  more  calmly,  touch 
ing  a  bell,  in  answer  to  which  his  black 
footman  entered,  "  show  this  person  the 
door.  Do  not  allow  him  access  to  me 
again." 

"  Yas,  suh." 

Cato  was  six  feet  two.     He  laid  his  hand 
on  the  man's  shoulder,  turned  him  to  the 
right-about,  and  marched  him  out. 
[160] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  You  may  kick  him  out,  Cato,"  cried 
the  Major  as  they  disappeared  through  the 
doorway. 

The  little  Major  sank  down  in  his  chair 
trembling  with  righteous  indignation.  He 
had  never  been  so  insulted  in  his  life.  The 
fact  that  the  man  had  given  away  the  secret 
and  that  Chalden  was  now  in  his  power 
never  came  to  him.  The  Major  was  not 
a  practical  man.  He  had  been  outraged 
in  his  finer  feelings,  and  not  the  least  hard 
portion  of  his  situation  lay  in  the  fact  that 
anyone  had  presumed  to  make  such  a 
proposition  to  him,  a  Whyot ! 

"  Cato,"  he  asked,  as  the  man  re-entered 
the  room,  "  did  you  kick  him  out?  " 

'  Yas,  suh,"  responded  the  black  man, 
rolling  his  eyes  with  delight  —  it  is  not 
often  a  negro  has  such  an  opportunity  — 
"  I  kicked  him  good,  suh,  an'  he  lay  at 
de  foot  of  de  steps,  suh,  a-shakin'  his 
fis'  an'  a-cussin'  most  awful,  suh.  He 
said " 

"  I  am  not  interested  in  what  he  had  to 
[161] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


say,  Cato,"  said  the  Major  loftily.     "  By 
the  way,  order  my  carriage  at  once." 

As  he  entered  the  coupe  anyone  passing 
might  have  heard  him  direct  his  coachman 
to  drive  to  the  Chalden  building,  where  he 
hoped  to  find  the  financier. 


[162] 


IX 


CHALDEN  was  very  much  surprised 
that  morning  when  the  Major's  card 
was  brought  to  him  in  his  private  office. 
Things  were  going  his  way  —  they  usually 
did  —  and  the  stocks  in  which  the  Major's 
property  was  invested  would  soon  be  in  his 
possession  at  his  own  price,  his  price  for 
everybody  and  everything  was  a  low  one 
—  like  the  devil  he  always  bought  cheap. 
The  day  would  see  the  ruin  of  the  Major. 
Naturally  it  immediately  occurred  to  Chal- 
den  that  the  Major  had  come  to  beg  off. 
He  at  once  jumped  to  the  conclusion,  al 
though  he  was  not  a  man  who  jumped  to 
conclusions  usually,  that  the  Major  would 
fain  purchase  his  safety  by  withdrawing 
his  opposition  to  the  marriage.  As  to  that 
Chalden  cared  not  a  whit  for  the  opposi 
tion  of  the  Major.  It  rather  pleased  him 
than  otherwise.  He  delighted  to  crush. 
[163] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

opposition,  and  he  was  never  so  unhappy 
as  when  the  day  was  made  plain  and  easy 
for  him.  Therefore  he  resolved  not  to 
stop  his  raid  on  the  Major's  stocks,  and 
not  to  be  moved  by  any  plea  which  might 
be  urged.  He  had  determined  on  the 
man's  ruin,  and  ruined  he  should  be.  After 
that,  if  the  Major  behaved  with  propriety, 
he  might  do  something  —  it  would  depend 
on  many  things.  He  kept  the  Major  wait 
ing  a  few  moments.  It  suited  his  pleasure 
to  do  so,  but  finally  he  directed  that  he 
should  be  admitted  into  the  private  office. 

The  agitation  and  indignation  of  the 
Major  had  not  evaporated  at  all.  On  the 
contrary,  they  had  become  greatly  inten 
sified.  The  more  he  thought  of  it  the 
more  angry  he  became.  Chalden  there 
fore  found  himself  confronted  by  a  very 
excited  little  man.  He  wondered  if  the 
Major  was  ever  calm.  This  morning  his 
red  face  was  redder  than  ever.  He  was 
fairly  shaking  with  emotion. 

"  Mr.  Chalden  — "  he  burst  out. 
[  164] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


"  Good  morning,  Major  Whyot.  Be 
seated,  sir.  What  can  I  do  for  you?  " 

"  For  me?  Nothing,  sir,"  spluttered 
the  Major;  "  we  have  not  been  —  our  re 
lations  —  in  short,  sir,  I  dislike  you,  as  you 
probably  dislike  me." 

"  You  didn't  come  here  to  tell  me  that, 
sir?" 

"  No,  sir,  but  a  damned  scoundrelly 
hound,  a  man  who  says  he  is  an  ex-clerk 
of  yours,  came  to  me  this  morning  with  a 
—  a  —  nasty  tale,  sir,  and  —  er  —  made 
a  proposition  to  me,  which  need  not  be  dis 
cussed,  but  it  was  infamous,  sir,  insulting 
to  me,  sir,  a  Whyot!  And  I  have  come 
to " 

"  To  blackmail  me,"  instantly  flashed 
into  the  mind  of  Chalden.  He  knew  there 
were  passages  in  his  past  which  he  would 
give  everything  he  owned  to  keep  secret. 
Fortunately  for  him  he  said  nothing.  If 
the  Major  had  not  been  so  excited,  how 
ever,  he  would  have  marked  the  change  in 
Chalden's  appearance.  Hard  at  best,  the 
[165] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

man  became  as  cold  as  an  iceberg.  His 
usually  immobile  face  was  as  expressionless 
as  a  stone  wall.  The  narrowing  of  his 
eyes,  the  gleam  that  came  in  them,  the  com 
pression  of  his  lips,  alone  betrayed  his  in 
domitable  spirit.  A  hard  man  to  blackmail 
was  Philip  Chalden. 

"  I  have  come  to  put  you  on  your  guard, 
sir,  against  the  scoundrel,"  continued  the 
little  man. 

He  had  never  appeared  to  better  advan 
tage  in  his  life  than  at  this  moment.  Chal- 
den's  jaw  relaxed,  his  brow  smoothed,  his 
eyes  opened  wider,  and  he  gazed  at  the 
Major  in  speechless  astonishment.  To 
have  an  advantage  and  not  to  use  it,  against 
an  enemy !  Why,  the  man  must  be  a  fool 
—  or  a  gentleman  ! 

There  was  good  blood  in  Chalden.  He 
rose  instantly  to  the  Major's  height.  For 
the  first  time  in  many  years  a  feeling  of 
shame  that  he  had  so  misjudged  the  other 
man  permeated  his  soul.  Chalden  as  a  rule 
was  only  ashamed  when  he  failed,  and  he 
[  166] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

had  no  cause  to  be  ashamed  on  that  score 
since  he  had  been  in  Philadelphia.  When 
he  spoke,  however,  his  remarks  were  en 
tirely  commonplace.  Yet  he  was  burning 
with  anxiety  to  know  what  was  the  rev 
elation.  It  might  be  any  one  of  several 
things  of  varying  degrees  of  importance  to 
him. 

"  What,  may  I  ask,  was  the  story?  " 
"  I   dislike  to  repeat  it,  sir,"   answered 
the  Major  slowly,  "  but  I  suppose  there  is 
no  help  for  it.    The  man  said  —  that  your 
name  was  Avery." 

"  I  told  you  that  myself  last  spring." 
"  You  did.    He  went  on  to  say  that  you 
were  from  St.  Louis." 

"  Another  piece  of  stale  news  to  you." 
"  It  was.    That  when  you  were  a  young 
man  —  forgive  the  repetition,   sir  —  your 
wife  —  ran  away — from  you   with  —  er 

—  your   best    friend,    that    you    followed 
them,  caught  them,  and  —  ah  —  shot  the 
man  dead.     Your  wife  committed  suicide 

—  after    that   you  —  ah  —  disappeared 

[167] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

with  your  daughter,  only  to  reappear  un 
der  a  new  name  some  fifteen  years  later  in 
Philadelphia " 

The  Major  spoke  hesitatingly  and  with 
difficulty.  He  regretted  extremely  even  to 
voice  the  story.  It  was  neither  a  pleasant 
nor  an  easy  task. 

"  Well,  sir,  is  that  all?  "  asked  Chalden 
coolly,  conscious  at  first  of  a  feeling  of  re 
lief  and  yet  wondering  if  there  was  more 
to  the  story. 

"That's  all,"  answered  the  Major; 
"  and  whether  the  story  be  true  or  not  — 
I  —  er  —  felt  it  due  from  one  gentleman 
to  another  to  apprise  you  immediately  of 
it  in  order  that  you  —  ah  —  might  take 
such  steps  as  your  judgment  dictates  to 
stop  the  scoundrel's  mouth." 

"The  man's  name  was " 

"  Jackens.  At  least,  that's  what  he  said 
it  was." 

"  I  know  him.  He  is  an  ex-clerk  of 
mine.  He  was  a  small  operator  in  stocks 
who  got  in  my  way.  I  broke  him,  then 
[168] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

out  of  pity  for  him,  one  of  the  rare  times 
when  I  have  given  way  to  the  sentiment, 
I  gave  him  employment.  He  was  a  scoun 
drel.  He  proved  false  to  his  trust.  There 
was  a  betrayal,  a  forgery.  He  fled.  I 
shall  know  how  to  deal  with  him." 

"  I  supposed  you  would,"  answered  the 
Major. 

"  Do  you  know  where  he  is  to  be 
found?" 

"  Er  —  no.  He  left  my  house  rather 
—  ah  —  suddenly.  In  fact,  I  am  ashamed 
to  say  that  I  lost  my  temper  with  him  and 
I  —  ah  —  caned  him  severely." 

"  He  is  twice  your  size,"  remarked 
Chalden,  surveying  the  slight  figure  of  the 
older  man,  "  and  half  your  age." 

"What  has  that  got  to  do  with  it? 
After  I  had  done  with  him  I  turned  him 
over  to  my  negro  servant  and  he  —  er  — 
kicked  him  out,  I  believe.  I  warned  him 
that  if  he  valued  his  life  he  would  better 
keep  quiet  about  his  —  ah  —  fabrication." 

"  It  is  a  true  story,"  interrupted  Chal- 
[169] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

den,  quietly.  "  Absolutely  true.  I  sup 
pose  it  is  bound  to  get  out  sooner  or  later. 
I  shall,  however,  silence  this  man  for  the 
present,  and  I  shall  depend  upon  your  con 
sideration  to  let  it  go  no  further." 

'  You  may  count  upon  me,  sir,"  an 
swered  the  Major. 

"  Of  course  this  action  of  yours  was 
taken  for  my  daughter's  sake?  " 

Chalden  watched  him  curiously  as  he 
asked  this  question. 

"  Well,  not  quite.  Of  course  I  should 
be  loath  indeed  to  see  her  —  or  any  other 
lady  —  involved  in  —  er  —  unpleasant 
publicity.  But  I  think  I  should  have  come 
to  you  in  any  event  —  as  —  a  —  ah  — 
gentleman,  you  know."  Whether  he 
meant  Chalden  or  himself  was  not  quite 
clear.  "  She  —  Miss  Alicia,  I  presume  — 
er  —  was  the  —  ah  —  daughter?  " 

"  You  may  presume  so,"  said  Chalden 
in  his  haughtiest  manner,  effectually  estop 
ping  any  further  inquiries  in  that  direc 
tion.  "  Now,  sir,  you  have  rendered  me  a 
[170] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

service.  Is  there  anything  I  can  do  for 
you?" 

"  Nothing,  sir,"  answered  the  Major, 
astonished  at  this  question. 

He  had  forgotten  all  about  the  mone 
tary  situation,  or  if  he  remembered  it  he 
was  not  the  man  either  to  ask  or  to  expect 
a  reward,  or  even  to  accept  any,  for  the 
doing  of  a  gentle  action. 

Chalden  questioned  him  further. 

"  This  marriage  is  still  distasteful  to 
you?" 

i(  It  is,  sir,"  more  surprised  than  ever. 

"  Ah,  well,  I  am  sorry,  for  I  have  set 
my  heart  upon  it." 

"  I  have  nothing  to  say  on  that  score," 
replied  the  older  man;  "naturally  this  — 
er  —  affair  has  not  made  me  feel  more 
kindly  toward  the  alliance  —  with  due  re 
spect  to  the  young  lady,  of  course.  How 
ever,  we  need  not  enter  into  a  further  dis 
cussion  of  that  point?"  Chalden  bowed 
gravely.  "  I  have  warned  you  of  the 
blackguard.  I  hope  you  may  be  able  to 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

deal  with  him,  and  I  have  the  honor  to  bid 
you  good-morning,  sir." 

The  Major  bowed  profoundly,  turned 
on  his  heel,  and  left  the  office.  This  time 
decidedly  the  honors  of  war  were  with 
him.  Chalden  instantly  summoned  his 
private  secretary  and  confidential  clerk. 

"  Johnson,"  he  said,  "  see  my  broker 
immediately.  Reverse  all  former  direc 
tions.  I  want  the  Whyot  stocks  forced  up 
to  the  highest  possible  price.  I  want  it 
done  immediately.  Don't  spare  any  ex 
pense  in  bulling  them  up.  Never  mind 
the  cost.  I  will  stand  for  it  whatever  it 
may  be." 

"  Very  good,  sir,"  answered  the  secre 
tary,  too  well  trained  to  show  his  surprise 
at  this  sudden  reversal  of  policy,  so  unusual 
in  his  employer;  "  but  don't  you  think  you 
had  better  give  me  a  line  to  the  broker,  the 
present  order  being  at  variance  with  the 
original  plan?  " 

"  Here  it  is,"  said  Chalden,  after  scrib 
bling  a  moment,  "  tell  him  to  lose  no  time 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

about  it.  I  want  to  see  the  stocks  go  up  at 
once,  before  the  exchange  closes,  and  they 
must  be  higher  than  they  were  before  we 
began  this  raid.  Send  somebody  in  to  me 
as  you  go  out." 

As  the  second  clerk  came  in  Chalden 
directed  him  to  call  up  on  the  telephone 
the  Director  of  Public  Safety  at  the  City 
Hall  immediately.  When  the  financier 
got  him,  a  brief  conversation  took  place 
which  sufficed  to  put  the  best  detectives  in 
the  city  on  the  track  of  Mr.  Jackens.  It 
would  not  be  a  difficult  matter  to  find  the 
man  who  showed  signs  of  such  severe 
handling  as  Major  Whyot  had  given  him, 
and  the  Director  promised  that  the  pris 
oner  should  be  at  Chalden's  service  in  a 
few  hours  without  fail. 

The  nerves  of  the  Major  were  so  broken 
and  shattered  by  the  events  of  the  morning 
that  he  concluded  to  go  to  his  club.  There 
about  twelve  o'clock  Buldon  and  Larnard, 
the  Major's  attorney  and  financial  agent, 
appeared  in  search  of  him.  They  found 


him  calmly  enjoying  a  cigar  over  the 
papers. 

"  Well,  you  did  it  all  right,"  exclaimed 
Buldon  when  they  got  him  alone  in  a  pri 
vate  room. 

"Did  what?"  asked  the  Major  inno 
cently. 

"  Man,  our  stocks  are  going  up !  "  cried 
the  operator  triumphantly.  "  Somebody  is 
bulling  the  market  like  mad.  There  has 
been  a  reaction.  I  do  not  know  the  cause 
of  it,  unless  you  did  it,  but  the  bears  have 
fled  to  cover.  Rumor  has  it  that  old 
Chalden  is  caught  on  the  wrong  side  of 
the  market  and  is  getting  tremendously 
cinched." 

The  Major  shuddered  at  his  friend's 
coarse  language  —  "So  Western,  you 
know!" 

"  We  are  helping  the  thing  along  all  we 
can,"  continued  Buldon  joyfully.  "  If  it 
all  goes  well  they'll  close  higher  than  they 
have  been  quoted  for  a  dozen  years,  and 
now  that  we  have  got  them  up,  we  will 
[174] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

keep  them  there.  Indeed,  nobody  seems 
to  have  any  particular  interest  in  bearing 
them  down.  You  are  saved,  Major.  We 
all  are.  Did  you  see  Chalden  this  morn- 
ing?" 

"  Yes,  I  saw  him." 

"  I  feel  that  we  owe  you  a  debt  of  grati 
tude,"  said  the  other;  "  how  did  you  put 
the  pressure  on  him?  " 

"Pressure,  sir?  By  gad!  Sir!"  burst 
out  the  Major,  enraged  all  over  again  just 
as  he  had  regained  a  measure  of  his  usual 
calm.  "  I  caned  one  man  this  morning  for 
daring  to  insinuate  that  I " 

"  No  offence,  no  offence,  Major,"  ex 
claimed  the  other  man.  "  Was  it  the  man 
I  brought  you  ?  " 

"  It  was,  sir." 

"And  his  story?" 

"  A  damned  outrageous  piece  of  black 
mailing!  " 

"  You  didn't  use  it  on  Chalden,  of 
course,"  remarked  Buldon,  warned  by  the 
Major's  rising  fury. 

[175] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"Certainly  not,  sir!  I  would  not  do 
such  a  thing  to  save  myself  from  ruin." 

"  May  I  ask  just  what  you  did,  Ma 
jor?  "  queried  Larnard  quietly. 

"  What  you  or  any  other  gentleman 
would  have  done.  I  had  the  blackguard 
kicked  out  of 'my  house,  and  then  I  went 
immediately  to  Mr.  Chalden  and  warned 
him  that  an  attempt  to  blackmail  him  was 
being  made." 

"  You  didn't  say  anything  about  the 
stocks?  " 

"  I  said  nothing,  sir,  nothing  but  that. 
Would  you  have  me  mix  up  my  business 
matters  with  an  affair  of  honor  of  that 
kind,  sir?" 

"  Certainly  not,  Major,"  promptly  an 
swered  the  astonished  Buldon,  winking  at 
the  broker.  "  Well,  at  any  rate,  the  stocks 
are  going  up." 

"  Did  Mr.  Chalden  say  anything  about 
these  stocks?"  asked  the  lawyer  curi 
ously. 

"  Nothing.  By  gad,  he  did  not  even 
[176] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

thank  me!"  answered  the  Major  with 
some  resentment. 

"Well,  Major,  shall  I  sell  or  hold 
them?  "  continued  Larnard.  "  What  shall 
I  do  with  your  shares?  " 

"  Hold  them,  sir,"  answered  the  Major 
promptly.  '  The  stock  is  just  as  good  now 
as  it  ever  was.  It  has  been  in  my  family 
ever  since  I  can  remember.  These  —  er 
—  fluctuations  are  unnatural,  I'm  sure." 

"  Very  good,"  said  the  broker  imper- 
turbably. 

"  Major,"  said  Buldon  as  they  took  their 
departure,  "  allow  me  to  say  it,  you  are  a 
gentleman.  You  put  us  all  to  shame." 

The  Major  was  utterly  unable  to  fathom 
the  curious  glances  of  the  men,  and  he 
would  have  been  more  surprised  at  the  up 
roarious  laughter  which  burst  from  them 
as  they  left  the  club. 

"  The  old  innocent,"  said  the  operator, 
"  he  worked  it  in  the  very  best  way.  Oh, 
unwittingly,  of  course,"  he  added  in  the 
face  of  the  other's  unspoken  protest.  "  He 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

could  not   have   driven   Chalden    an   inch 
with  anything,  I  fancy." 

"  I  do  not  think  we  would  better  men 
tion  this  affair  to  anyone,"  returned  the 
lawyer.  "  Or  we  shall  have  to  deal  with 
Chalden  ourselves,  and  he's  a  good  man  to 
be  at  peace  with." 

'  Yes,"  returned  the  other,  "  we  must 
keep  it  entirely  quiet.  And  I  doubt  if  we 
could  improve  on  the  Major's  methods 
anyway." 


X 


ALICIA  CHALDEN  and  her  father 
during  the  past  six  months  had  en 
tered  upon  a  new  relationship  to  each 
other.  Philip  Chalden  had  shown  more 
tenderness  for  his  daughter  in  that  time 
than  he  had  manifested  toward  her  during 
all  the  rest  of  her  life.  During  her  school 
days  she  had  seen  but  little  of  her  father, 
whom  she  had  adored  possibly  because 
she  knew  so  little  of  him.  He  had  rarely 
visited  the  school,  and  in  her  long  vaca 
tions  he  had  usually  managed  to  send  her 
abroad  or  upon  some  sightseeing  expedi 
tion,  under  the  care  of  some  of  the  teachers, 
who  were  always  ready  to  undertake  the 
duties  of  a  chaperon  on  such  a  liberal  scale 
as  Chalden's  generosity  encouraged. 

He  cheerfully  supplied  Alicia  with  ev 
erything  for  which  she  asked,  and  many 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

/ 

things  for  which  she  had  not,  and  as  evi 
dence  of  the  satisfaction  he  felt  in  her 
treatment  at  the  school  he  had  been  one 
of  the  most  generous  benefactors  of  Brook- 
ford  College.  He  rebuilt  Hulswood  Hall 
after  the  fire,  for  instance,  making  it  the 
finest  college  dormitory  building  in  the 
country.  Beginning  with  her  graduation, 
when  he  suddenly  awakened  to  the  realiza 
tion  of  her  beauty  and  intelligence,  had 
come  a  new  order. 

Beneath  his  cold  exterior,  his  natural 
and  sedulously  cultivated  calm,  he  was  a 
man  with  great  capacity  for  affection. 
Disuse  had  not  quite  atrophied  this  faculty. 
That  he  had  kept  his  feelings  under  control 
for  so  long  had  made  the  giving  way  to 
them  the  more  sweeping.  Into  the  lonely 
heart  of  the  man  Alicia  had  made  way, 
until  now  she  had  become  all  in  all  to  him. 
He  had  worked  for  the  mere  pleasure  of 
succeeding.  He  had  beaten  down  opposi 
tion,  he  had  mastered,  wherever  he  went, 
whatever  he  touched,  for  supremacy's  sake. 
[180] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


Now  he  was  working  for  Alicia's  sake. 
Yet  he  said  nothing  about  it. 

There  was  a  cloud  upon  Alicia's  birth 
through  no  fault  of  her  own.  Well,  he 
would  make  up  to  her  for  it,  if  he  could, 
by  leaving  her  mistress  of  such  wealth  as 
had  never  been  enjoyed  by  any  mortal 
woman  before.  She  was  beautiful,  she  was 
gracious,  she  was  cultured,  she  was  charm 
ing.  He  would  make  her  rich  beyond  the 
most  extravagant  desire,  he  thought.  Al 
lied  to  Doctor  Whyot,  who  was  a  splendid 
representative  of  the  ancient  family  whose 
name  he  bore,  she  would  take  and  maintain 
a  position  second  to  none  in  the  land.  The 
material  forces  of  the  world  he  had  at  his 
command.  He  would  lay  them  at  the  feet 
of  Alicia.  Whatever  happened  she  should 
have  money,  and,  as  has  been  said,  money 
was  still  Philip  Chalden's  god. 

On  her  part,   while  Alicia  dreamed  no 

dreams  of  untold  riches,  she  gloried  in  her 

father's  new-found  affection  for  her.     She 

had  divined  in  a  little  while,  after  she  had 

[  181] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

come  home  to  live  with  him,  that  Philip 
Chalden  could  not  unlearn  in  a  few  days 
the  habits  of  years.  He  was  actually  as 
undemonstrative  as  the  Major  fancied  he 
was,  but  Alicia  knew  and  thrilled  to  the 
softer  light  in  the  old  man's  eyes,  the 
flicker  of  a  smile  upon  his  stern,  cold  lips, 
the  fugitive  resort  to  a  caress,  when  he  laid 
an  unwonted  hand  awkwardly  but  tenderly 
upon  her.  Yet  as  the  days  passed  by,  and 
she  saw  more  and  more  of  her  father, 
Alicia  was  not  altogether  happy  in  his 
affection. 

Alicia  was  a  woman  of  the  very  highest 
principle ;  her  intimates  at  school  called  her 
Quixotic.  Perhaps  she  had  a  little  of  the 
narrowness  of  enthusiastic  youth.  Time, 
which  dims  the  eye,  would  soften  her  views 
and  widen  her  horizon,  of  course.  Alicia 
would  no  more  have  done  a  wrong  thing 
than  she  would  have  cut  off  her  hand. 
Time  would  not  change  that,  but  age 
might  bring  charity  and  a  tolerant  heart; 
for  the  present  she  was  a  little  severe,  but 
[182] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


more  severe  with  herself  than  with  anyone 
else.  She  brought  to  the  service  of  her 
moral  efforts  the  same  qualities  which  had 
brought  success  to  her  father.  She  was  a 
High  Churchwoman,  with  many  of  the 
qualities  of  the  devotee.  Nothing  mean, 
or  low,  or  small,  found  lodgement  in  Ali 
cia's  breast.  She  was  pure,  unselfish,  hon 
orable  to  the  last  degree.  And,  as  she  knew 
her  father  better,  as  he  unwittingly  took 
her  more  and  more  into  his  confidence,  as 
he  unconsciously  allowed  her  to  see  his 
estimates  of  men  and  things,  as  she  began 
to  apprehend,  dimly  of  course,  his  habit  of 
thought,  his  business  methods,  she  began  to 
question  in  her  own  mind  the  ethics  of  her 
father. 

With  the  consciousness  of  his  affection 
came  the  consciousness  of  —  what  shall  it 
be  called?  —  his  moral  weakness,  from  her 
point  of  view.  She  saw  with  pain  that 
he  was  unaware  of  her  unspoken  censure, 
that  he  saw  nothing  wrong  in  transactions 
which  she  reprehended  in  her  heart.  He 

[183] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

did  not  know  or  realize  what  she  was 
thinking,  for  she  shrank  from  discussing 
the  matter  with  him  —  as  yet.  Chalden 
did  nothing  criminal,  nothing  actionable; 
he  used  the  methods  and  means  in  vogue, 
which  his  opponents  used,  without  scruple. 
He  played  the  game  as  he  had  learned  to 
play  it;  he  played  it  better,  however,  more 
subtly,  more  successfully  than  anybody 
else. 

Whether  her  father's  ideas  were  legal 
or  illegal  was  nothing  to  Alicia.  She 
looked  beyond  the  letter  of  the  law,  and 
little  by  little  a  poisonous  conviction  that 
her  father  did  not  attain,  did  not  try  to 
attain,  did  not  even  recognize,  the  high 
standard  she  set  for  herself,  entered  as  a 
blight  upon  the  growing  intimacy  in  which 
she  had  taken  such  pride  and  delight. 
That  her  father  should  be  at  fault !  It  was 
crushing.  She  might  have  lost  faith  in 
man,  in  God,  but  for  the  sterling  integrity 
of  her  lover,  and  for  the  saintly  piety  and 
pure  disinterestedness  of  one  like  Henry 
[184] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

Olney,  whose  powerful  helper  she  had  be 
come.  Alicia  spent  many  agonized  hours 
trying  to  decide  what  was  her  duty  in  refer 
ence  to  her  father.  But  she  had  not  yet 
solved  the  question. 

Between  her  lover,  her  father,  and  her 
work  she  found  no  time  for  idleness.  The 
latter  especially  engrossed  her  time  during 
the  day.  As  Alicia  came  nearer  and  nearer 
the  practical  side  of  the  problem,  as  she 
herself  got  in  touch  with  the  actual  negro, 
she  found  the  theories  which  she  had 
formed  were  terribly  incomplete  and  in 
adequate.  The  difficulties  confronting  her 
endeavor  grew  steadily  greater  as  she  in 
creased  in  knowledge,  but  she  faced  them 
with  the  indomitable  resolution  of  her 
father.  She  had  lost  no  faith  whatever  in 
the  basic  correctness  of  her  ideas.  She  had 
the  serene  self-confidence  of  the  fanatic, 
the  martyr.  She  never  doubted  for  a  mo 
ment  but  that  God  was  with  her,  as  He 
had  been  her  preserver  —  but  she  recog 
nized  the  obstacles  which  constantly  sprang 
[185] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


up  in  her  way.  The  theory  under  which 
she  was  working  was  undoubtedly  correct, 
but  how  bring  about  the  realization  of  the 
dream?  Rougher  hands  than  Alicia's  had 
grappled  with  that  problem,  greater  brains 
than  hers  had  sought  to  solve  it,  and  are 
still  trying  to  solve  it,  in  vain;  but  Alicia 
was  young  and  undaunted,  she  did  not 
despair. 

The  temporal  and  spiritual  affairs  of  the 
mission  prospered  as  never  before.  Olney 
should  have  been  the  happiest  man  in  the 
world  had  his  work  been  first  in  his  heart. 
His  parish  was  a  centre  of  activity  and  suc 
cessful  missionary  work,  such  as  always 
results  from  a  combination  of  opportunity, 
talent,  and  money.  The  negroes  of  the 
city  furnished  the  opportunity,  Alicia  pro 
vided  the  money,  Henry  Olney  the  talent; 
yet  Olney  was  the  unhappiest  man  alive. 
The  glory  of  self-sacrifice  had  vanished. 
Though  he  had  stayed  his  hand  for  Alicia's 
sake,  he  felt  farther  away  from  her  than 
before.  Devote  himself  as  he  could  to  the 
[186] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

work  of  his  parish,  its  widening  scope  only 
brought  him  more  frequently  in  the  pres 
ence  of  the  woman  he  loved  without  hope, 
and  that  hopelessness  was  fast  becoming 
unbearable. 

He  saw  her  so  often  now  that  the  effort 
required  to  maintain  his  personal  immo 
bility  was  killing  him.  So  successful  had  he 
been  that  Alicia  at  last  felt  less  conscious  of 
his  devotion  than  at  first.  Perhaps  she  had 
been  mistaken,  so  superb  had  been  his  self- 
effacement.  As  her  father,  and  her  lover, 
and  her  work,  engrossed  her  the  more, 
Olney  felt  that  he  was  becoming  simply  a 
machine  to  her.  Not  that  her  gracious 
kindness,  her  unfailing  courtesy,  was  ever 
abated,  but  she  was  a  little  forgetful  of 
him.  He  had  revelled  in  the  knowledge 
that  she  knew  that  he  loved  her,  though  he 
might  not  speak.  He  had  felt  that  she  had 
pitied  him,  and  he  was  so  beggared  in  self- 
esteem  by  the  constant  realization  of  that 
one  black  streak  in  him,  that  he  had  craved 
even  her  pity.  But  now  he  realized  that 
[187] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

she  was  getting  away  from  his  influence. 
Mad  jealousy,  hopeless  affection,  all  were 
breaking  him  down.  He  was  fairly  perish 
ing  with  a  love  that  was  unknown,  unre 
quited,  and  impossible. 


[188] 


XI 


LATE  in  the  afternoon  of  the  day  the 
Major  called  upon  her  father  at  his 
office  Alicia  drove  back  to  her  home  from 
her  daily  visit  to  the  mission.  The  highly 
trained  English  factotum  met  her  as  she 
entered  the  hall. 

'There  is  a  —  er  —  person  in  the  li 
brary  waiting  for  you,  Miss  Chalden,"  he 
said  as  she  turned  to  the  stairs. 

"  What  sort  of  a  person?  "  asked  Alicia 
curiously,  the  man's  manner  was  so  strange. 
"  Er  —  a  very  badly  knocked  up  man, 
I  should  say,  Miss." 

"  Knocked  up?    What  do  you  mean?  " 
''  Well,  he  is  all  done  up  in  bandages. 
His  head  has  been  hammered  by  somebody, 
his  clothes  are  torn." 

"  What  does  he  want  of  me?  " 
"  He  says  he  wants  to  see  you  on  par- 
[189] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

ticular  business.  He  seems  to  be  in  an  aw 
ful  hurry.  He's  been  a-fidgetin'  like  mad 
in  the  room  there.  I  didn't  want  to  admit 
him,  Miss,  but  he  said  it  was  a  matter  of 
great  importance.  I've  had  James  "  — 
the  other  footman  —  "  a-watchin'  him  ever 
since.  Will  you  see  him,  Miss?  " 

"  Certainly,  Robert,"  answered  the  girl. 
"  Stay  within  call,  so  that  you  can  come  to 
me  if  I  need  you." 

With  some  curiosity  Alicia  entered  the 
library,  from  which  James,  the  footman, 
immediately  made  his  exit  upon  a  signal 
from  her,  and  surveyed  the  man. 

Mr.  Jackens  was  a  painful  spectacle. 
He  had  evidently  gone  to  a  hospital  and 
had  had  his  face,  cut  and  bruised  fearfully 
from  the  Major's  fierce  caning,  done  up  in 
bandages.  He  rose  nervously  to  his  feet 
as  the  girl  came  in. 

"  Miss  Chalden,"  he  cried,  "  your  fath 
er,  ma'am?  " 

"  He  will  not  be  here  for  some  time. 
Do  you  wish  to  see  him?  " 

[  190] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 


"God  forbid!" 

Alicia  was  very  much  surprised  at  this 
ejaculation,  whose  fervency  denoted  its 
honesty. 

'  What  can  I  do  for  you?"  she  said, 
advancing  toward  him.  "  You  seem  to  be 
injured,  or  in  pain." 

"  It's  nothing  to  do  with  that,"  he  cried 
roughly;  "  I  hate  your  father.  He's  used 
me  ill." 

"  It  is  not  possible  that  he  is  responsible 
for  this?  "  asked  Alicia  in  alarm. 

"  No,  curse  it,"  cried  the  man. 

"  Stop !  "  exclaimed  the  girl  decisively. 
"If  you  wish  to  talk  to  me  further  you 
must  refrain  from  language  of  that  kind. 
Another  word,  sir,  in  that  strain,"  she  con 
tinued,  extending  her  hand  toward  the  elec 
tric  bell  on  the  library  table,  as  he  opened 
his  mouth  to  protest,  "  and  I  will  have  you 
put  out  of  the  house." 

The  baffled  man  glared  at  her,  quiver 
ing  with  impotent  rage. 

"  I  thought  you  were  in  trouble,  suffer- 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

ing,"  continued  Alicia  composedly,  "  and 
perhaps  had  come  to  me  for  help.  But  I 
see  I  have  been  mistaken.  Now  you  will 
declare  your  business  at  once." 

She  looked  so  like  her  father,  the  words 
came  from  her  with  such  clear-cut  decision, 
that  the  man  secretly  quailed  before  her. 

"  I  was  beat  up  this  way  by  a  man  named 
Whyot." 

"Not  Doctor  Whyot!" 

"  No,  it  was  his  uncle.  He  done  me  up. 
They  both  did." 

"  I  don't  understand." 

'  The  uncle  beat  me,  the  doctor,  not 
knowin'  it,  bandaged  me." 

"  I  have  no  interest  in  all  this,"  said 
Alicia,  "  and  I  don't  see " 

"  You  have;  your  father  done  me  an  in 
jury.  I'm  goin'  to  get  even  with  him  in 
the  person  of  his  daughter,  however  I  can. 
Your  mother " 

The  man  stopped  abruptly  to  give 
weight  to  his  disclosure  by  his  hesitation, 
and  then,  to  stimulate  the  curiosity  of  the 

[  192] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

woman  before  him,  he  said  again,  slowly 
and  with  a  malevolent  leer  at  her: 

"Your  mother " 

"  What  of  my  mother?  " 

"  Did  you  know  her?  Do  you  remem 
ber  her?" 

"  I  cannot  conceive  that  my  personal 
affairs  have  any  interest  whatever  to  you," 
answered  the  girl  haughtily,  although  her 
heart  was  beating  wildly.  The  man's  man 
ner  was  at  once  so  mean  and  so  sinister. 
Alicia  was  brave,  but  in  spite  of  herself  a 
cold  fear  gripped  her  heart.  She  would 
hear  no  more. 

;<  I  must  terminate  this  conversation. 
You  say  my  father  injured  you.  Though 
I  do  not  believe  it,  you  would  better  have 
recourse  to  him.  I  decline  to  discuss  my 
mother,  or  anything  further  with  you.  As 
it  is " 

She  extended  her  hand  toward  the 
bell. 

"  Don't  touch  that  bell!  "  cried  the  man 
suddenly,  "  unless  you  want  me  to  tell 

[  193] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

your  servants  that  your  mother  was  an 
adulteress,  a  suicide,  and  your  father  a 
murderer!  " 

"What  do  you  mean?"  asked  the  girl 
in  bewilderment.  She  was  too  surprised  to 
take  in  the  full  import  of  the  disclosure; 
indeed  there  was  so  much  of  it  and  it  was 
of  such  a  nature  that  at  first  it  failed  of  its 
purpose. 

"  I  mean  what  I  say!  "  said  the  man, 
disappointed  at  her  unexpected  calm. 
"  It's  true.  Your  mother  ran  away  with 
another  man,  your  father  shot  the  man 
dead,  then  she  committed  suicide.  Your 
mother  left  you  a  baby  in  arms." 

"It  is  false!" 

"  It's  the  truth.  Don't  you  put  on  any 
of  your  airs  with  me  !  Why,  you've  got  no 
right  to  the  name  you  bear.  Your  real 
name  is " 

"  You  scoundrel!  "  exclaimed  Alicia,  be 
ginning  to  take  in  the  purport  of  the  man's 
abominable  words  and  instantly  resolving 
to  hear  nothing  more,  "  to  come  here,  here 
[  194] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

to  me,  a  woman,  with  such  a  scandalous 
tale !     Not  another  word !  " 

She  struck  the  bell  fiercely,  and,  not  sat 
isfied  with  that,  she  raised  her  voice. 

"James!     Robert !"  she  called. 

The  two  men,  who  had  waited  without 
in  the  hall,  instantly  entered  the  room. 

'What  are  you  going  to  do?"  cried 
the  man  in  alarm.  "  Do  you  want  me  to 
tell  them?" 

'  Tell  anybody,"  she  answered  royally. 
"  I  am  not  affected  by  such  a  tissue  of  lies 
as  those  you  have  told  me,  but  there  is  one 
person  to  whom  you  shall  tell  them." 

"Who  is  that?" 

"  My  father." 

"  Good  God!  "  gasped  the  man. 

"  Yes,  and  you  shall  stay  here  until  he 
comes.  Robert,  you  and  James  see  that 
this  person  doesn't  leave  this  room;  not  un 
der  any  circumstances,  until  Mr.  Chalden 
returns." 

"  I'll  tell  them,"  yelled  the  baffled  man, 
green  with  fear. 

[195] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  You  say  a  word,  you  open  your  mouth 
—  damn  you  —  beggin'  your  pardon,  Miss 
Chalden  — "  said  Robert,  who  had  been  in 
the  family  for  many  years  and  was  as  faith 
ful  as  he  was  trusted,  "  and  I'll  break  your 
face  up  worse  than  it  is !  You'll  need  more 
bandages  on  than  you've  got  now  when  I 
get  through  with  you.  I  don't  want  to  hear 
none  of  your  lies!  " 

"  Don't  hurt  him,  Robert,"  said  Alicia, 
smiling  faintly. 

"  No'm,  I  won't.    Just  leave  him  to  us." 

"  Very  well,"  said  the  girl,  as  she 
stepped  into  the  hall.  ''  I  will  wait  for 
Mr.  Chalden  in  the  drawing-room." 

"  For  God's  sake,  men !  "  began  Jackens 
piteously  when  they  were  alone. 

"Shut  up!"  said  Robert;  "you're  not 
to  talk,  d'ye  understand?  " 

"  I  ain't  goin'  to  tell  you  nothin',"  per 
sisted  the  man,  "  I  jest  want  to  get  out. 
Good  Lord,  I  don't  want  to  face  that  man ! 
I'll  make  it  worth  your  while " 

"  I  tell  you  to  shut  up,  and  I  mean  it! 
[196] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

Miss  Chalden  is  not  here  now,  and  I  swear 
to  you  if  you  open  your  mouth  again  I'll 
hit  you,"  cried  the  big  footman,  shaking 
his  huge  fist  in  front  of  the  man's  broken 
face. 


[  197] 


XII 

ALICIA  walked  into  the  drawing-room 
with  her  mind  in  a  strange  turmoil. 
Of  course  the  statement  was  a  lie.  She 
would  dismiss  it  from  her  mind  and  leave 
the  man  to  her  father.  That  was  easier 
said  than  done.  For  instance,  no  one  may 
escape  completely  from  the  influence  of 
that  most  despicable  of  communications, 
an  anonymous  letter.  It  has  its  effect; 
though  the  letter  be  of  the  most  wildly 
improbable  character,  one  cannot  forget  it. 
Instantly  there  came  into  the  mind  of 
the  girl  that  she  literally  knew  nothing 
about  her  mother.  Her  father  had  per 
sistently  refused  to  talk  of  her,  no  picture 
of  her  existed,  at  least  she  had  never  seen 
one.  All  she  really  knew  was  that  her 
mother  had  died  in  giving  her  birth.  She 
did  not  know  anything  of  her  father's  an- 
[198] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

cestry  even.  She  had  lately  been  told  that 
he  had  been  born  in  St.  Louis,  and  that  was 
all.  Her  earliest  recollection  was  of  Italy. 
The  only  woman  she  associated  with  her 
infancy  was  old  black  Aunt  Nancy,  and  she 
was  dead. 

Suppose  there  were  some  truth  in  the 
story?  What  a  disgrace!  To  be  the 
daughter  of  a  woman  who  had  —  no,  it 
was  not  true,  it  could  not  be!  Yet  why 
had  her  father  never  told  her  anything 
about  her  mother?  Why  had  he  sternly 
dismissed  the  subject  whenever  she  had 
touched  upon  it?  The  poison  of  the  ac 
cusation  permeated  her  being.  Was  it 
possible  that  her  mother  had  been  so  lost 
as  to  break  —  She  would  put  it  out  of  her 
mind !  It  was  a  lie,  a  wicked  lie,  why 
should  she  credit  it?  The  unsupported 
statement  of  a  man  of  that  stamp  against 
the  life  of  her  father,  her  honorable  father, 
upright  —  Oh,  God,  what  had  she  learned 
from  her  father's  business  conduct?  Was 
he  an  upright  man?  What  had  she  begun 
[  199] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

dimly  to  apprehend  of  his  code  of  morals  ? 
Was  there  a  man's  blood  on  his  hands? 

Ah,  if  she  had  but  known  it,  the  blood 
of  many  men  was  upon  him.  The  life,  the 
fortune,  the  happiness,  of  many  had  hung 
upon  the  turn  of  his  hand,  the  nod  of  his 
head.  He  had  beggared  men  and  dishon 
ored  women;  not  directly,  of  course,  but 
still  none  the  less  surely,  as  the  result  of 
his  gigantic  operations. 

Yet,  if  the  awful  tale  were  true?  If  her 
mother  had  betrayed  her  father!  If  he 
had  killed  the  man,  had  taken  vengeance 
in  his  own  hands!  What  then?  Was  he, 
could  he  have  been,  justified? 

Alicia  threw  herself  upon  her  knees  and 
prayed  as  she  had  never  prayed  before. 
For  the  first  time  in  her  life  trouble  that 
sank  deep  down  in  her  soul  was  upon  her. 
She  prayed  that  it  might  not  be  true,  pray 
ing  none  the  less  fervently  because  she  be 
gan  to  feel  that  she  was  praying  against 
a  hopeless  fact.  Her  prayers  brought  lit 
tle  comfort,  therefore.  She  felt  revolted 
[  200  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

in  her  soul  at  the  possibility.  Her  father, 
entering  the  hall  in  his  usual  noiseless  man 
ner,  caught  sight  of  her  on  her  knees. 

"  Alicia,"  he  asked,  "  what's  the  mat 
ter?" 

"  Oh,  father,"  she  answered,  rising  and 
going  toward  him,  "  tell  me  that  it  isn't 
true!" 

"What  isn't  true?"  he  asked,  slipping 
his  arm  around  her  waist  to  support  her. 
He  perceived  that  she  was  trembling  like  a 
leaf  and  her  face  was  very  white.  "  What 
has  happened?"  he  questioned  anxiously. 

"  I  have  been  told  a  —  story  about  my 
—  my  —  mother." 

Alicia,  drawn  close  to  him,  could  feel  the 
start  which  even  his  iron  self-repression 
could  not  control.  There  was  no  indig 
nant  question  from  him.  The  man,  she 
instantly  realized,  was  on  guard,  waiting. 

"  It  isn't  true !  "  she  cried  in  alarm. 

"What  isn't  true?"  again  asked  Chal- 
den  sternly,  and  his  own  heart  almost 
stopped  its  beating  in  fear  of  her  answer. 
[201  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

He  made  a  false  move,  sure  proof  of  his 
intense  perturbation.  "  Who  has  been 
here?"  he  said  suddenly.  "Is  it  that 
canting  hypocrite,  Olney?" 

"Why,  father!  "  questioned  the  girl  in 
startled  surprise.  "  Mr.  Olney !  What 
has  he  to  do  with  it?  No,  it's  another 
man!" 

"Thank  God!"  Chalden  exclaimed, 
and  the  ejaculation  was  stored  away  in  the 
girl's  mind  to  be  brought  to  light  later, 
"What  did  he  say?" 

"  He  said  —  I  don't  like  to  tell  you. 
He  said  that  my  mother  was  an  —  adul 
teress,  a  suicide.  That  you  —  killed  him. 
That  she  left  me,  a  baby  —  that  my  name 
is  not  Chalden." 

The  relief  in  the  man's  face  was  toe 
great  to  be  described.  If  Alicia  had  not 
been  so  excited  she  would  have  marked  it. 
He  stood  silent,  enfolding  her  in  his  arms. 
His  heart  was  beating  as  it  had  never  beat 
before.  He  could  have  faced  the  loss  of 
his  fortune,  power,  position,  everything, 
[  202  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

with  more  equanimity  than  he  welcomed 
his  escape  from  the  greatest  crisis  that 
could  have  come  into  his  life.  Although 
he  said  nothing,  his  brain  was  preternatu- 
rally  active.  Never  had  he  thought  with 
such  clearness  and  concentration.  He  in 
stantly  dismissed  his  first  fear. 

It  was  evident  to  him  after  the  first 
startled  surprise  that  Jackens's  story  in 
some  way  had  come  to  his  daughter.  He 
had  thought  of  the  possibility  that  some 
time  it  might  be  made  public.  He  had 
striven  with  all  his  skill  to  keep  it  con 
cealed.  He  would  rather  anyone  had 
heard  it  than  Alicia,  and  now  it  had  been 
brought  directly  to  her.  It  was  bad  enough 
as  it  was  —  but  —  what  should  he  do? 
Should  he  deny  it  all?  His  keen  mind  per 
ceived  instantly  that  that  would  involve 
him  in  explanations;  that  if  he  denied  this 
story  he  might  have  to  tell  her  that  which 
he  had  so  long  concealed.  Besides  it  was 
scarcely  possible  under  the  circumstances 
for  him  successfully  to  deceive  her  entirely, 
[203] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

though  he  longed  to  do  so.  Yes,  he  would 
tell  her.  There  was  truth  anyway  in  the 
story,  to  admit  it  was  safest. 

"Did  Major  Whyot  tell  you?"  he 
asked  after  a  pause,  thinking  perhaps  after 
all  the  Major  had  proved  a  traitor,  and 
regretting  as  he  asked  that  he  had  spared 
him. 

"  Major  Whyot !  What  has  he  to  do 
with  it?  First  Mr.  Olney,  then  Major 
Whyot.  Ah!  It  is  true.  You  don't  an 
swer  me !  I  am  the  daughter  of  that  poor, 
wicked  woman!  What  is  our  name?" 

"  My  name  is  Avery." 

"  And  is  that  my  name?  " 

"  Naturally." 

"And  my  mother?  " 

"  Dear  child,"  said  Chalden,  drawing 
her  to  him  again,  "  I  would  have  spared 
you  this.  I  am  grieved  beyond  expression 
that  you  have  learned  it.  I  cannot  deny 
it.  The  story  is  true.  I  married,  very 
early  in  life,  a  young  woman,  one  of  my 
own  class  in  St.  Louis  —  I  was  born  among 
[204] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

the  best  and  noblest  there  —  and  I  loved 
her  —  God,  how  I  loved  her!  "  exclaimed 
the  old  man. 

All  the  restraints  of  years  were  suddenly 
flung  away  from  him.  He  told  the  story 
with  all  the  fervor  and  passion  of  a  lover; 
all  the  anger,  bitterness,  of  the  betrayed, 
vibrant  in  his  voice.  He  was  speaking 
truly  now,  the  girl  could  feel  it  as  she 
listened. 

"  I  lavished  everything  on  her.  One 
child  was  born  to  us,  a  daughter.  The 
woman  was  not  worthy  of  my  love.  My 
best  friend  —  it's  an  old  story,  but  true. 
I've  tried  to  put  the  remembrance  of  it  out 
of  my  mind  for  years.  They  both  deceived 
me  basely.  I  pursued  them,  and,  blind 
with  rage,  shot  the  man  at  her  feet  and 
left  them.  The  woman  I  had  loved  and 
the  man.  One  alive,  one  dead.  When 
they  found  them  they  were  both  dead. 
The  woman  had  exculpated  me.  She  left 
a  note  saying  she  had  taken  her  own  life. 
I  disposed  of  my  property,  changed  my 
[205] 


name,  and  left  the  country.  I  was  the  last 
of  my  family.  The  change  of  name  was 
easy.  I  was  baptized  Charles  Henry  Alden 
Avery.  I  dropped  Avery,  prefixed  my 
father's  name,  and  put  the  initials  to  the 
Alden." 

"And  the  baby?" 

"  The  baby  died " 

;<  What!  "  she  cried  in  horrified  amaze 
ment.  "And  I?" 

"  No,  no,"  he  said,  "  you  confuse  me. 
The  mother  died,  not  the  baby.  I  took 
the  baby  with  me  —  to  Italy.  I  lived  there 
a  number  of  years.  Report  of  my  death 
was  spread  about  by  my  own  contrivance. 
It  was  published  broadcast,  and  then,  after 
a  long  time,  I  came  to  Philadelphia.  No 
one  knew  me.  You  know  the  rest." 

"And  was  I  that  baby?" 

And  this  time  no  nervous  tremor  shook 
the  frame  of  the  man  again.  Alicia  lifted 
her  head  from  his  breast  and  looked  at 
him  as  if  she  would  fain  look  into  his  very 
soul.  But  he  was  on  his  guard  now;  his 
[206] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

face  was  a  mask  behind  which  she  could 
see  nothing.  He  seemed  so  calm  and  so 
strong  that  her  dawning  suspicions  were 
lulled  into  assurance.  His  perfectly  simu 
lated  coolness  disarmed  her. 

"  Of  course,"  he  said  quietly,  "  of 
course." 

"My  poor,  poor  father!"  Her  first 
thought  was  for  him ;  later  she  would  think 
of  herself.  "How  you  have  suffered! 
But  you  should  have  told  me." 

"  I  concealed  it  for  your  happiness,  my 
dear,"  answered  Chalden. 

"  I  know,  but  I  am  —  we  are  —  a  false 
pretence,  father.  We  do  not  go  under  our 
rightful  name.  We  can't  even  tell  any 
body  without  spreading  this  awful  truth. 
Oh,  father,  how  could  she  do  it?  How 
could  she  do  it?  The  daughter  of  a  dis 
honored  woman !  What  have  I  ever  done ! 
The  sins  of  the  parents,  they  are  visited  on 
the  children.  I  learned  that  at  school,  but 
I  never  knew  its  meaning  before.  How 
could  she  do  it?  My  poor  father,  but  we 
[207] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

have  each  other.  I  shall  never  leave  you 
now.  I  shall  show  you  that  even  with  this 
tainted  blood  in  my  veins  I  can  still  be 
true." 

"What  do  you  mean?" 

"  I  cannot  marry  Doctor  Whyot  now. 
I  cannot  allow  it.  You  know  how  op 
posed  to  me  all  his  relatives  are.  How 
proud  even  the  doctor  himself,  although 
he  does  not  think  of  those  things  quite  as 
the  rest  of  his  people  do,  is  of  his  pure,  un 
blemished  ancient  lineage." 

"  Alicia,  this  is  madness !  " 

"  No." 

"  He  does  not  know,  he  need  not  know." 

"  I  must  tell  him." 

"That  is  folly!" 

"  Father,  when  one's  record  is  not  clear, 
when  one's  own  mother  was  a  —  one  must 
be  the  more  honorable  on  account  of  that." 

"But,  Alicia " 

"  Don't!  Don't  urge  me.  We  look  at 
things  in  different  ways.  I  have  my  own 
ideas  of  honor.  You  have  yours.  I  must 
[208] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

be  governed  by  mine.  Don't  plead  with 
me,  father!  Let  me  respect  the  only  hon 
orable  parent  I  have." 

Chalden  tore  himself  from  her,  put  his 
hand  to  his  head  and  walked  up  and  down 
the  room  in  great  agitation.  Whyot  was 
the  one  man  in  Philadelphia  he  would  have 
chosen  for  Alicia.  And  now  she  was  about 
to  reject  him!  Arguments,  appeals  rose 
to  his  lips,  but  he  decided  not  to  bring 
them  forth  then.  He  would  seek  a  more 
fitting  season,  to  wait  would  do  no  harm, 
he  had  often  won  only  by  waiting.  And 
there  was  another  thing  troubling  him. 

"Who  told  you  this  story?"  he  finally 
burst  out. 

"  A  man  who  came  to  the  house  this 
afternoon." 

"Yes,  but  what  man?" 

"  He  is  in  the  library,"  said  the  girl. 
Noticing  the  murderous  gleam  that  sprang 
into  his  eyes  as  he  turned  away,  she  ex 
claimed  hurriedly,  "  You  won't  hurt  him?  " 

"Hurt  him?"  cried  her  father,  reach- 
[209] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

ing  up  his  arms  as  he  spoke  and  opening 
and  closing  his  hands  with  a  convulsive 
motion,  a  gesture  the  more  sinister  because 
he  so  rarely  permitted  himself  the  luxury 
of  any  outward  manifestation  of  his  feel 
ings,  "I  will  choke  him  to  death  with  my 
naked  hands !  " 

Chalden  infrequently  gave  way  to  his 
emotions.  To  do  so  was  a  luxury  in 
which  he  did  not  often  indulge.  He  con 
trolled  himself  and  others  thereby.  His 
abandonment  at  this  time  was  the  more 
impressive  therefor.  If  he  had  had  the 
man  before  him  he  would  undoubtedly 
have  killed  him.  Alicia  clung  to  him  des 
perately. 

"  Father,  I  will  not  let  you  go  until  you 
promise  me  you  will  not  hurt  that  man! 
I  will  stay  with  you  until  you  promise. 
There  must  be  some  other  way  to  silence 
him.  It  is  no  disgrace  to  you,  and  as  for 
me  I  would  rather  have  it  known  than  have 
you  to  —  Promise  me !  I  won't  let  you 
go  until  you  do !  " 

[210] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  I  can  keep  him  quiet,  Alicia.  The 
man  is  absolutely  in  my  power.  He 
thought  to  injure  me  through  you,  and 
then  escape.  He  tried  to  sell  his  news  to 
Major  Whyot  this  morning;  the  Major 
beat  him  as  you  see." 

"  Will's  uncle,"  said  the  girl,  a  thrill  of 
pride  in  the  Major's  action  lighting  up  her 
face  for  a  moment. 

'  Yes,  there  is  good  blood  in  them,  even 
if  the  little  Major  has  gone  to  seed.  I 
stopped  a  raid  on  his  stocks  this  morning, 
and  he  is  richer  now  than  he  was  before." 

"  That  was  noble  of  you.  Did  he  ask 
you?" 

"  Certainly  not!  The  man  is  a  gentle 
man,  which  in  business  is  tantamount  to 
calling  him  a  fool.  I  don't  understand 
what  Jackens  waited  for." 

"  He  had  to." 

"Had  to?    Why?" 

"  I  made  Robert  and  James  keep  him 
until  you  returned." 

"  Good !    I  suppose  he  has  told  them  ?  " 

[211] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  No,  I  do  not  believe  he  has.  From 
what  I  saw  of  Robert's  method  of  dealing 
with  him,  I  think  he  has  been  kept  quiet. 
They  would  not  allow  him  to  speak.  You 
won't  hurt  him,  father?  Promise  me! 
You  are  all  I  have  now.  I  can't  even  love 
the  memory  of  a  —  mother!  " 

The  girl's  voice  quivered  and  broke. 

"  Alicia,"  said  the  man,  deeply  moved 
by  her  touching  appeal,  "  whatever  hap 
pens  to  me,  whatever  you  may  learn,  I 
want  you  to  believe  one  thing,  that  if  I 
have  ever  done  you  a  wrong  I  love  you  as 
I  have  never  loved  woman  before.  I  want 
you  to  believe  that  I  think  you  are  worthy 
the  respect,  the  devotion,  of  the  best  of 
humanity." 

"  That  makes  up  to  me  for  a  great  deal. 
Now,  you  won't  lay  your  hands  on  that 
man,  will  you?  I  want  that  promise,  be 
cause  I  have  only  you  now.  I  could  not 
bear  to  see  you " 

"  I  shall  not.     Now,  let  me  go." 

"  No,  I  must  go  with  you.  When  I 
[212] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

have  told  him  one  thing  then  I  shall  leave 
you." 

As  the  two  entered  the  library  Jackens 
fairly  cowered  from  the  sight  of  Chalden's 
heavy  brow  and  lowering  countenance. 

"Oh,  for  God's  sake,  sir,  Mr.  Chal- 
den  — "  cringed  the  man. 

"  Be  still !  "  said  the  other  sharply. 
''  Robert  and  James,  keep  within  call  out 
side.  Has  the  man  said  anything  to  you?  " 

"  Not  a  word,  sir,"  answered  Robert. 
"  I  wouldn't  let  him." 

"  You  are  a  rare  and  faithful  servant, 
Robert,"  said  Chalden,  "  and  I  shall  not 
forget  it." 

"  Yes,  sir,"  replied  the  man  gravely  and 
simply  as  he  went  out  and  closed  the  door. 

It  was  more  praise  than  Chalden  had 
given  him  for  years.  He  was  one  of  those 
who  followed  the  financier's  fortune  with 
blind  devotion,  and  in  such  rare  words  he 
found  adequate  reward. 

"  Mr.  —  what  is  this  man's  name, 
father?" 

[213] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  Jackens." 

"  Mr.  Jackens,  I  did  you  an  injustice. 
I  said  that  you  lied.  I  still  think  you  what 
I  said  you  were,  a  heartless  villain  and  a 
scoundrel,  but  you  are  not  a  liar,  and  I  am 
sorry  I  said  so." 

"  Oh,  Miss,  won't  you  please " 

u  I  do  not  need  to  do  anything  to  help 
you,"  said  Alicia,  "  except  to  remind  you 
that  we  are  told  to  forgive  those  who 
trespass  against  us.  You  have  trespassed 
against  my  father  and  against  me  sorely," 
she  went  on  piteously,  "  but  I  —  we  — 
forgive  you." 

She  included  Chalden  in  her  statement, 
but  without  permission  or  justification;  one 
look  at  his  face  showed  that  to  Jackens, 
who  writhed  under  it. 

"  Oh,  Miss,  if  you  will  only " 

"  Father  has  promised  me  that  he  will 
not  hurt  you,  and  he  always  keeps  his  word. 
Won't  you,  father?" 

"  I  will.    Now  go,  Alicia." 

Left    alone    with    the    man,     Chalden 

[214] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

stepped  to  him  cowering  down  on  the  floor 
before  him.  His  hands  fairly  twitched  to 
get  at  him. 

"You  promised  her!  "  gasped  the  man 
in  mortal  terror. 

"  And  I'll  keep  my  promise,"  answered 
the  other.  "  But  I  think  you  know  how 
I  would  like  to  strangle  you.  I've  just  one 
word  to  say  to  you.  You  told  your  story 
to  Major  Whyot,  and  he  came  straight  to 
me  with  it.  Then  you  told  it  to  my  daugh 
ter.  Have  you  mentioned  it  to  anyone 
else?" 

"  No,  sir,  so  help  me  God,  sir!  " 

'  Well,  sir,  I've  taken  occasion  to  refer 
to  your  past  and  I've  learned  your  career. 
After  you  fled  from  my  employ  I  had  de 
tectives  put  on  your  track.  I  knew  how 
you  felt,  and  I  wanted  to  protect  myself 
against  all  possible  attacks  from  such  as 
you.  I've  looked  your  career  up  from  the 
beginning.  I  know  you  to  be  one  of  the 
blackest  hearted  scoundrels,  in  a  small  way, 
that  ever  lived.  I'm  not  surprised  at  your 
[215] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

attempt  to  do  this.  There  is  evidence 
enough  in  my  possession  to  put  you  in  the 
State  prison  —  for  life.  I  don't  know  but 
that  there  is  evidence  enough  to  hang  you. 
That  store  that  was  burned  down!  The 
women  in  it.  The  forgery  of  my  name 
which  I  stopped  before  you  could  realize 
anything  on  it.  The  abstraction  of  those 
bonds.  There's  murder,  arson,  theft,  for 
gery!  Do  you  mark  that?  This  is  not 
theory  on  my  part,  I  have  the  papers  in 
my  office,  in  my  safe.  I'm  not  bluffing. 

"  You  will  come  down  to  my  office  to 
morrow  at  ten  o'clock.  I  want  you  to  be 
perfectly  certain  that  I  have  the  evidence 
there,  that  I  can  dispose  of  you  as  I  wish, 
that  I  can  hang  you,  or  at  least  imprison 
you  for  life.  Then  I  want  you  to  know 
that  if  you  ever  open  your  mouth  about 
that  story,  or  about  me,  or  mine,  in  any 
way,  so  help  me  your  God  —  if  you  believe 
in  any  —  that  moment  you  betray  me  I  will 
fix  you.  I  am  rich  enough  to  keep  you  in 
sight  forever.  If  you  are  not  at  my  office 
[216] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

to-morrow  morning  at  ten  o'clock,  a  war 
rant  will  be  issued  for  you  immediately. 
You  are  a  marked  man  already.  Do  you 
know  what  I  did  as  soon  as  you  left  me 
yesterday?  I  telephoned  the  Director  of 
Public  Safety  to  cause  you  to  be  appre 
hended  and  brought  to  me.  There  is  the 
telephone  ringing  now,"  continued  Chal- 
den,  as  the  bell  jangled  from  the  desk. 
He  picked  up  the  receiver. 

"  Yes,"  he  answered,  "  this  is  Mr.  Chal- 
den.  Ah,  the  Director  of  Public  Safety. 
Yes,  you  have  found  the  man?  You  traced 
him  to  my  house  this  afternoon,  and  you 
report  that  he  has  not  been  seen  to  leave 
it."  Chalden  lifted  his  head.  "Come 
here,  my  man.  I  want  you  to  hear  for 
yourself.  Now,  take  that  receiver.  I 
want  you  to  be  perfectly  sure  that  I  am 
stating  the  truth.  You  see,"  he  added,  as 
the  frightened  wretch  put  down  the  re 
ceiver,  "  now  you  have  your  choice.  I'll 
telephone  the  Police  Department  now  that 
you  are  here  and  they  are  to  follow  you 
[217] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

after  you  leave  and  not  let  you  get  away. 
You  understand  that  I  have  only  to  lift  my 
hand  and  you  are  done  for.  You  can  de 
cide  by  ten  o'clock  to-morrow  morning 
whether  your  life  and  liberty  are  worth 
more  to  you  than  the  telling  of  this  tale. 
If  I  had  not  promised  that  girl  that  I  would 
not  hurt  you,  you  would  never  leave  this 
house  alive.  Now  go !  Remember  what 
I've  said  and  be  at  my  office  at  ten  o'clock 
to-morrow  morning." 

"  I  may  not  be  admitted,  sir." 

"  Yes,  you  will.  Here  is  a  card.  I  will 
leave  instructions  there  for  your  recep 
tion." 

"  But  don't  I  get  any  money?  "  whined 
the  abject  man. 

"Not  a  dollar,  not  a  cent!  You  may 
count  yourself  lucky  in  getting  out  alive. 
Robert,"  said  Chalden,  as  that  person  en 
tered  in  answer  to  the  bell,  "  show  this  man 
to  the  door." 

After  the  man  had  gone  Chalden  sat 
down  at  the  desk  and  laid  his  face  upon  it. 
[218] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

The  sweat  had  come  out  upon  his  fore 
head,  although  the  room  was  cold.  He 
brushed  it  away  from  his  haggard  brow. 
He  looked  years  older,  he  was  almost  as 
shaken  in  body  and  spirit  as  if  he  had  had 
a  stroke. 

"  My  God,"  he  murmured,  "  my  God, 
what  an  escape!     If  she  only  knew!  " 


XIII 

ALICIA   had   instantly  made   up   her 
mind  to  break  her  engagement  with 
Doctor  Whyot. 

The  girl  was  intensely  proud.  Without 
saying  much  about  it,  scarcely  even  realiz 
ing  it,  she  had  been  as  proud  of  her  good 
name,  of  her  ancestry,  as  the  Major  of 
his;  in  a  different  way,  but  as  strongly  as 
he.  She  discovered  that  when  she  found 
she  had  no  reason  to  be.  It  had  been 
more  or  less  an  unconscious  pride;  just  as 
she  had  taken  her  ancestry  for  granted, 
from  her  self-consciousness,  so  she  had 
fitted  herself  into  the  imaginary  situation. 
The  crushing  shock  of  the  discovery  of  her 
mother's  infamy,  her  father's  flight,  the 
change  of  name,  the  years  in  a  foreign 
city,  and  so  on,  swept  her  away  from  her 
usual  moorings.  She  felt  lost  in  the  situa 
tion  which  confronted  her.  There  was 
[  220  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

nothing  in  her  experience  or  in  her  theories 
of  life  which  would  adequately  enable  her 
to  rise  above  it. 

In  a  perfect  agony  of  shame  and  humil 
iation,  with  a  heart-break  for  the  blight 
that  had  come  so  suddenly  and  unexpect 
edly  upon  her,  she  sat  down  and  wrote  to 
her  lover.  She  told  him  the  naked  truth, 
and  then,  after  declaring  her  surprise  and 
horror  at  the  facts,  which,  she  assured  him, 
she  had  not  known  until  that  night,  she 
peremptorily  broke  the  engagement. 

Never,  she  said,  would  she  consent  to 
allow  the  anticipated  marriage  to  take 
place.  While  he  was  greatly  different 
from  the  rest  of  his  family,  yet  she  real 
ized,  and  gladly,  that  he  was  by  no  means 
free  from  a  proper  amount  of  that  pride 
of  birth  and  ancestry  which  his  family  ex 
hibited  so  extravagantly.  They  had  often 
spoken  together  of  the  privilege  and  the 
joy  of  an  untarnished  name,  an  unblem 
ished  character,  and  a  pure  ancestry. 

In  view  of  what  she  had  learned,  in  view 
[221  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

of  the  fact  that  the  name  she  bore  was  not 
her  rightful  one,  in  view  of  the  possibility, 
nay,  the  certainty,  that  sooner  or  later  the 
whole  disgraceful  story  would  come  out, 
she  could  not  consent  that  the  engagement 
should  continue.  She  could  not  marry 
him,  she  could  never  marry  anyone,  with 
such  a  cloud  upon  her. 

She  made  no  secret  of  her  love  for  the 
man;  indeed,  it  was  impossible  to  disguise 
it.  In  the  very  act  of  renunciation,  her  de 
votion,  in  despite  of  her  mind,  shone  clear 
and  true  and  strong.  The  sentences  with 
which  she  said  good-by  rang  more  pas 
sionately  than  any  she  had  ever  written  or 
spoken  to  him.  Because  it  was  the  last 
time,  she  abandoned  herself  to  her  feel 
ings,  and  they  overwhelmed  her. 

It  was  a  noble  letter,  and  Alicia  was 
a  noble  person.  Her  sense  of  honor  was 
keen,  and  deeply  engrained  in  her  being. 
She  prayed,  after  she  had  posted  the  let 
ter,  that  Whyot  might  not  call  upon  her 
that  evening.  The  strain  of  telling  him 
222 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

face  to  face  what  she  had  written  would 
have  been  more  than  she  could  have  borne, 
and  love  gave  Alicia  insight  enough  to 
know  that  her  own  person  would  be  the 
most  potent  argument  in  preventing  that 
cool  and  dispassionate  consideration  of  her 
resolution  which  she  demanded  of  her 
lover.  Alicia  was  absolutely  determined 
upon  her  course  of  action.  The  strong, 
masterful,  forceful  traits  of  her  father  ap 
peared  in  her  character  in  curious  streaks. 
Generally  amenable  to  argument,  appeal, 
persuasion,  she  sometimes  exhibited  a  de 
termination  —  her  enemies  might  have 
called  it  an  obstinacy  —  which  amounted 
to  impenetrable  hardness. 

Her  heart  was  fairly  breaking  over  the 
sad  end  she  foresaw  to  her  love  affair,  yet 
she  never  for  a  moment  contemplated  an 
alteration  in  her  decision.  As  to  what 
Dr.  Whyot  would  do  she  could  not  tell. 
She  hoped  —  that  was  the  woman  of  it  — 
that  he  might  refuse  to  accept  her  renun 
ciation  of  him  and  that  he  might  come  to 
[223] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

plead  with  her  later  on,  when  she  had  in 
a  measure  recovered  from  the  trials  of 
the  day.  In  that  case,  however,  she  was 
firmly  resolved  that  she  would  never  give 
way.  She  would  never  go  to  him  as  a 
wife  unless  she  could  feel  herself  in  every 
respect  his  equal. 

This  confounding  herself  with  her  an 
cestry  was  a  distinctly  unphilosophic  view 
for  a  Doctor  of  Philosophy  to  take,  yet  she 
took  it.  It  ran  counter  to  her  theories  of  the 
inherent  equality  of  individuals,  but  she 
did  not  hesitate  on  that  account.  She  be 
lieved,  for  others,  that  each  man  made  his 
own  place,  and  was  to  be  judged  on  his 
own  merits;  but  she  could  not  make  her 
theory  fit  her  own  case.  The  best  of  us  are 
creatures  of  contradiction,  men  as  well  as 
women.  Alicia  resolved  to  break  her  en 
gagement,  in  contravention  of  her  theories 
of  life;  yet  she  wished  her  lover  to  come 
to  her,  to  appeal  to  her,  to  plead  with  her, 
in  defiance  of  her  inhibition.  She  said  to 
him,  "  Come  no  more,"  and  if  he  did  not 
[224] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

come,  though  he  came  upon  a  fruitless 
errand,  her  heart  would  break! 

Yes,  Alicia  believed  with  all  her  soul  in 
the  essential  equality  of  individuals,  no 
matter  what  the  several  accidents  of  birth, 
color,  or  station,  might  be.  Yet  she  took 
upon  herself  the  sins  of  her  mother  and 
created  thereby  an  inequality  between  her 
self  and  the  rest  of  the  world  —  that  is, 
Doctor  Whyot.  Strange  and  illogical  con 
clusion  for  a  Doctor  of  Philosophy,  but  be 
fore  she  earned  that  good  degree,  and  after 
as  well,  she  was  yet  a  woman.  A  woman 
in  all  but  her  resolution. 

Alicia  was  very  unhappy.  She  slept  not 
at  all  that  night.  Her  cheeks  burned 
against  the  pillow  as  she  thought  of  the 
shame  in  what  should  be  to  the  child  the 
very  fount  of  altruism  and  pure  affection, 
her  mother.  With  morbid  sensitiveness 
she  felt  the  taint  of  evil  in  her,  as  if  she 
had  herself  been  guilty. 

Her  thoughts  dwelt  often  upon  her 
father.  There  was  comfort  there.  How 
[225] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

noble,  how  good,  he  had  been!  No  won 
der  he  was  embittered  toward  society.  No 
wonder  he  had  made  war  upon  it  and  mas 
tered  it.  No  wonder  he  had  withdrawn 
himself  from  the  world  awhile.  He  had 
done  it  from  the  impulse  of  a  poignant  and 
never  dying  memory.  But  now  he  had 
changed.  Not  in  his  methods,  or  in  his 
manners,  or  in  his  practice,  perhaps  —  men 
do  not  change  the  habits  of  years  in  a  mo 
ment,  unless  under  the  inspiration  of  a 
great  catastrophe  or  in  the  presence  of  a 
crisis  —  but  he  had  changed  his  object. 
He  was  working  and  gathering  for  her 
now. 

She  forgot,  in  the  rush  of  her  new  affec 
tion,  other  things  that  had  begun  to  hurt 
her.  It  was  pitiful  from  one  point  of  view, 
but  she  clung  the  more  desperately  to  the 
honorable  position  of  her  father  now  that 
she  had  been  stricken  so  sorely  on  the  ma 
ternal  side.  She  shut  her  eyes  to  the  things 
which  had  moved  her  so  profoundly,  which 
had  gone  far  to  open  her  eyes  to  the  true 
[226] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

inwardness  of  some  of  her  father's  actions. 
Her  being  went  out  to  him  in  a  wave  of 
affection  which,  had  the  lonely  man  be 
low,  sitting  in  the  library,  quiet  and  still, 
staring  at  nothing  with  relief  and  terror 
yet  in  his  face,  comprehended,  might  have 
deepened  his  relief  while  it  added  to  his 
terror  and,  in  spite  of  all,  filled  his  heart 
with  joy. 

Well,  Alicia  would  devote  herself  to  her 
father,  to  her  work.  Perhaps  God  had 
marked  her  out  in  this  way  by  making  it 
impossible  for  her  to  enjoy  the  earthly 
happiness  which  in  the  morning  had  been 
her  fondest  dream.  She  would  work 
among  the  poor  people  who  already  looked 
to  her  as  the  chief  among  those  who  were 
to  lead  them  into  higher  planes  of  living 
and  thought.  What  was  her  loss  should 
be  their  gain.  She  would  send  for  Mr. 
Olney  in  the  morning.  There  was  a 
scheme,  dear  to  his  heart,  from  which  she 
had  hitherto  shrunk,  it  demanded  so  much 
personal  service  of  her,  but  she  would  now 
[227] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

espouse  it  with  earnestness,  with  glad 
ness. 

Yet  it  was,  after  all,  a  miserable  girl 
who  came  to  this  noble  conclusion. 

Morning  brought  no  comfort  either  to 
the  broken  girl  or  to  the  man  who  looked 
as  if  he  had  escaped  death  by  the  shading 
of  a  hair.  Because  they  were  creatures  of 
convention  they  went  through  the  usual 
routine  of  life.  One  must  eat  and  drink, 
if  one  cannot  be  merry,  though  death  be  in 
the  house  or  shame  in  the  heart.  Each 
concealed  from  the  other  how  deep  had 
been  the  hurt  and  strove  to  put  on  a  sem 
blance  of  cheerfulness.  Alicia  was  loath  to 
part  with  her  father  that  morning.  She 
sent  him  to  his  office  with  the  memory  of 
a  clinging  embrace  and  a  fervent  kiss  hang 
ing  about  him.  Those  made  the  situation, 
the  real  situation,  the  harder  to  bear. 

Chalden  found  Jackens  waiting  for  him, 
and  easily  convinced  that  cringing  and 
thoroughly  terrorized  mortal  of  the  indis 
putable  character  of  the  evidence  in  his 
[228] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

possession.  When  the  ex-clerk  left  the 
office  of  his  former  employer  there  was  no 
fear  on  Chalden's  part  that  the  man  would 
ever  cause  him  further  trouble  —  at  least 
not  until  his  death.  There  was  some  little 
satisfaction  for  Chaiden  in  this  manifesta 
tion  of  power.  Power  is  power,  whether 
it  is  wielded  against  the  helpless  or  the 
strong.  Even  the  crushing  of  a  mere  weak 
ling  is  not  without  pleasure  to  the  man  who 
crushes  it,  provided  he  has  the  crushing 
spirit. 

But  Chaiden  had  been  greatly  shocked 
by  the  whole  affair.  If  this  man  had  at 
last  found  out  what  he  believed  he  had 
taken  such  successful  steps  to  prevent  ever 
coming  to  light,  others  might  do  the  same. 
They  might  do  more.  The  security  in 
which  he  had  lived  was  gone  in  a  moment. 
That  was  Chalden's  weakness;  to  imagine 
that  anything  in  his  past,  in  the  past  of  a 
man  of  such  prominence  as  he,  could  be 
forever  concealed. 

And  there  was  another  phase  of  Chal- 
[  229  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

den's  life  the  opening  of  which  would  have 
moved  him  to  vastly  greater  sorrow  than 
the  discovery  of  the  misconduct  of  his 
wife.  For  the  first  time  in  years  the  man 
was  unable  to  concentrate  himself  upon  his 
work.  There  is  always  business  of  moment 
to  demand  the  attention  of  a  great  finan 
cier,  and  for  the  first  time  he  felt  inade 
quate  to  it.  He  dismissed  his  secretary  to 
the  outer  office,  refusing  himself  to  all 
callers  on  the  plea  of  urgent  private  affairs, 
and  sat  moodily  alone  in  front  of  his  great 
desk.  His  attitude  was  singularly  like  that 
assumed  by  one  who  expected  a  blow.  A 
premonition  of  disaster  was  in  the  air.  He 
waited. 

Doctor  Whyot  received  Alicia's  letter 
just  as  he  was  leaving  his  office  to  attend 
a  confinement  case  of  great  urgency.  He 
read  it  standing  on  his  door  step.  His  first 
impulse  was  to  go  to  her  instantly,  but  the 
poor  woman  to  whose  bedside  he  was 
called  required  immediate  attention.  The 
shock  of  the  letter  was  so  great  that  he 
[230] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


hardly  felt  equal  to  the  responsibilities  of 
the  case,  which  he  had  reason  to  believe 
would  prove  serious,  yet  his  pride  instantly 
came  to  his  rescue  and  his  sense  of  duty. 
The  woman  suffering  bodily  pain  must 
first  receive  attention,  the  poor  woman  who 
required  his  professional  services  had  the 
first  claim.  The  woman  who  was  suffering 
from  heart-break  must  wait.  Always,  ev 
erywhere,  the  woman  who  suffers  from 
heart-break  must  wait.  A  cut  finger  takes 
precedence  over  a  bruised  soul  even. 

Whyot  summoned  his  resolution  to  his 
aid  and  determined  to  do  his  duty  as  a 
physician,  under  the  appeal  made  by  a  pro 
fession  which  exacts  from  its  followers  the 
devotion  of  a  priest,  the  consecration  of  a 
martyr,  the  labor  of  a  serf.  Alicia  must 
wait. 

He  scribbled  a  hasty  note  on  his  pre 
scription  tablet  to  the  Major,  with  whom 
he  had  striven  to  keep  on  terms  of  speech 
at  least  during  the  period  which  had 
elapsed  since  the  famous  dinner,  asking 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

him  to  meet  him  early  in  the  afternoon  at 
the  Loyal  Club,  to  which  he  promised  to 
repair  as  soon  as  he  could  get  free  from 
his  duties.  For,  on  second  thoughts,  he 
concluded  that  he  must  see  the  Major  be 
fore  Alicia.  He  did  not  trust  himself  to 
answer  Alicia's  letter,  but  pencilling  a  line 
upon  another  tablet  blank  told  her  he  had 
received  her  letter  and  begged  her  to  re 
main  at  her  own  home  until  he  appeared, 
as  he  had  an  imperative  call  of  duty  which 
prevented  his  coming  to  her  at  once.  The 
letter  closed  with  the  assurance  that  the 
girl  craved,  that  he  did  not  love  her  for 
her  family,  her  ancestry,  but  for  herself. 

She  was  fully  determined,  and,  realizing 
her  determination,  it  would  have  been  bet 
ter  for  her  to  avoid  him;  yet,  after  she  had 
read  it,  she  carefully  remained  at  home 
during  the  morning,  waiting.  There  the 
Reverend  Henry  Olney  found  her,  a  prey 
to  nervousness  and  agitation  and  sorrow 
vastly  greater  than  her  power  of  conceal 
ment. 

.[232] 


XIV 

WHEN  the  Reverend  Henry  Olney's 
card  was  put  in  Alicia's  hand  a 
sudden  flash  of  memory  brought  back  her 
father's  strange  remark  of  the  afternoon 
before.  She  had  forgotten  it  in  the  rush 
of  events,  and  now  she  wondered  vaguely 
what  he  might  have  meant  by  the  refer 
ence.  Was  it  possible  that  the  clergyman 
knew  the  shameful  story  which  had  been 
revealed  to  her?  If  so,  how  had  he  found 
it  out?  How  long  had  he  known  it?  Her 
father  had  always  spoken  in  detestation  of 
him.  His  coming  to  the  house,  especially 
since  Aunt  Nancy's  death,  had  been  a  dis 
tinct  concession  to  her  desires  on  Chalden's 
part.  So  far  as  she  knew  there  had  been 
no  intercourse  between  her  father  and  Ol- 
ney  of  any  sort,  yet  the  first  thought  evi 
dently  that  had  come  into  Chalden's  mind 

[  233  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

when  she  had  told  him  the  story  was  that 
either  the  Major  or  Olney  had  been  her 
informants.  While  the  reference  to  the 
Major  had  been  accounted  for,  that  to 
Olney  had  not.  What  did  Olney  know, 
was  the  question  which  confronted  her 
with  his  card. 

A  strange  feeling  of  resentment  came 
over  her.  She  could  hardly  express  why 
she  felt  this  resentment,  at  least  a  frank 
explanation  would  have  involved  an  aban 
donment  of  her  sociological  position  of 
inherent  equality  in  individuals,  which  she 
still  maintained  except  so  far  as  Whyot 
and  herself  were  affected  by  these  new  de 
velopments  ;  yet  there  was  the  fact  that  she 
did  resent  any  knowledge  of  her  private 
affairs  by  a  man  who,  from  his  mixed 
blood,  she  instinctively  felt,  in  spite  of  her 
theories,  to  belong  to  an  inferior  race. 
Alicia  at  that  moment  was  a  living  protest 
against  her  theory  —  and  for  the  second 
time. 

It  did  not  then  occur  to  her  that  in  the 
[234] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 


end  the  discovery  of  such  a  secret  in  her 
father's  past  would  be  inevitable,  and  that 
when  it  was  published  it  would  be  known 
to  everyone,  high  and  low,  black  and 
white.  Her  world  at  that  particular  in 
stant  was  limited  to  Olney,  and  him  she  did 
not  wish  to  know  it.  If  the  story  were 
published  broadcast  no  doubt  there  would 
be  something  to  dull  the  anguish  of  her 
consciousness  in  the  very  publicity  which 
would  be  given  it.  If  everybody  knew  it 
the  worst  would  be  over,  but  to  have  a  man 
whom  she  had  unconsciously  and  unwit 
tingly  dominated  know  it  was  unbearable. 
She  only  considered  that  domination  in 
his  case  —  Olney  approached  so  nearly 
her  own  racial  status  that  she  instinctively 
armed  herself  against  him.  She  never 
troubled  her  head  or  her  heart  about  such 
questions  when  she  was  brought  in  con 
tact  with  the  lower  classes  of  negroes  — 
and  to  have  that  secret  known  to  Olney, 
to  feel  herself  an  object  of  his  pity —  It 
was  intolerable ! 

[235] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


She  did  not  feel  that  way  about  Doctor 
Whyot  at  all.  She  wanted  his  pity  be 
cause  she  loved  him,  and  she  expected  it 
because  he  loved  her,  although  all  was  at 
an  end  between  them.  However,  Alicia 
realized  that  speculations  concerning  Olney 
and  herself  were  not  profitable,  and  if  the 
man  did  know  that  secret  which  was  crush 
ing  her  he  was  in  no  way  responsible  for 
the  knowledge  and  could  not  honestly  be 
held  accountable  therefor  by  any  right- 
minded  person.  She  did  him  the  justice  to 
acknowledge  that  he  had  never  presumed 
upon  such  knowledge  in  any  way  —  if  he 
had  it  —  and  that,  although  for  the  first 
time  she  fairly  admitted  it  to  herself,  or 
took  open  cognizance  of  the  fact,  that  he 
was  in  love  with  her,  he  had  never  in  any 
way  borne  himself  save  with  the  most  re 
spectful  decorum;  that  he  had  been,  in 
short,  a  self-repressing,  self-respecting  gen 
tleman  in  all  his  intercourse  with  her. 

These  things  did  not  give  her  any  great 
amount  of  comfort,  but  they  forced  her  to 
[236] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

endeavor  to  put  all  such  vagrant  ideas  out 
of  her  mind  and  to  receive  him  precisely 
as  she  was  accustomed  to  do.  Moreover, 
on  one  account  she  was  anxious  to  see  him. 
The  breaking  of  her  engagement,  the  new 
determination  to  throw  herself  with  more 
vigor  and  energy  into  her  chosen  work, 
the  necessity  she  felt  for  his  guidance,  the 
hoped  for  benefit  of  his  wise  assistance, 
should  have  rendered  him,  and  did,  save 
for  the  thoughts  she  had,  a  most  opportune 
visitor. 

She  was  sitting  in  the  library  at  the  time, 
and  she  gave  orders  at  last  that  he  should 
be  admitted.  Had  it  been  Doctor  Whyot 
whom  she  expected  to  open  the  door  she 
would  have  given  instant  thought  to  her 
appearance.  Indeed,  had  Alicia  been  a 
girl  of  wider  acquaintance  among  men,  and 
had  she  expected  anyone  of  her  own  class, 
she  would  have  considered  her  looks  in 
spite  of  everything.  With  Olney  it  was 
different.  He  was  a  clergyman  and  — 
well,  at  any  rate  she  gave  no  thought  to 
[237] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

her  appearance.  She  did  not  even  exert 
herself  to  banish  the  evidences  of  her  grief 
and  despair. 

The  man  saw  her  therefore  entirely  dis 
armed,  off  her  guard,  indifferent.  Even 
an  ordinary  observer  would  have  marked 
the  signs  of  that  sorrow  which  had  changed 
her  outlook  upon  life  over  night  and  had 
settled  upon  her  as  a  blight.  An  eye  as 
keen  as  Olney's,  backed  by  an  intellect  as 
subtle,  instigated  by  a  heart  as  passionate, 
with  that  touch  of  oriental  fineness  of  per 
ception,  which  came  from  that  little  streak 
of  sun-kissed  tropic  blood,  saw  very  much 
more. 

The  whole  woman  in  her  anguish  and 
agony  was  revealed  to  him.  He  could 
have  borne  her  joy,  he  had  schooled  him 
self  to  contemplate  her  happiness  without 
manifesting  one  jot  of  his  feelings,  but  her 
grief  moved  him  beyond  his  power  of  con 
trol.  Yesterday  she  had  been  the  personi 
fication  of  youth,  of  hope,  of  freedom 
from  care;  to-day  it  was  as  if  a  cloud  had 
[238] 


A   DOCTOR    OF    PHILOSOPHY 


been  drawn  around  her  horizon.  Her  pale 
face  was  whiter  than  ever.  The  passion, 
the  touch  of  life,  had  gone  from  it.  There 
were  circles  under  her  eyes,  the  very  droop 
of  her  figure,  the  slow  turn  of  her  head  as 
she  lifted  her  eyes  to  meet  his  glance,  be 
spoke  some  crushing  blow.  He  could  see 
that  it  was  not  physical,  that  some  mental 
shock  had  robbed  her  of  the  joy  of  life. 

"  Good  heavens  !  "  he  cried.  "  Miss 
Chalden,  what  has  happened. 

He  stepped  nearer  to  her  in  his  anxiety, 
nearer  than  he  had  ever  approached  her. 
She  noticed  his  long  graceful  fingers 
twined  together  and  clinched  as  if  they 
would  break  from  the  pressure.  They 
made  a  white  tremulous  blur  in  front  of 
his  long  black  clerical  coat. 

"  What  is  the  matter?  "  he  cried. 
"  j j " 

She  stopped.  How  much  did  this  man 
know?  Could  she  ascertain  without  be 
traying  herself?  She  would  try. 

"Why  do  you  ask?" 

[239] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

'  You  look  —  forgive  me  —  so  — 
broken." 

The  man's  voice  quivered  with  his  anxi 
ety.  Alicia's  eyes  opened.  His  guard  was 
off,  too.  She  was  looking  into  his  soul  as 
he  was  looking  into  her  own.  There  was 
no  doubt  of  his  feelings  now.  The  touch 
of  sorrow  had  enlightened  them  both.  To 
love,  to  suffer  together,  is  it  not  at  last  to 
see,  sometimes  to  believe?  She  would  be 
careful.  She  answered  him  evenly: 

"  I  am  very  well." 

"  Yes,  physically,  perhaps,  but  some 
thing  has  happened.  Tell  me.  What  is 
it?  I  must  know!  " 

His  imperative  manner  shocked  her, 
there  was  a  sense  of  equality,  nay,  mastery, 
in  it.  The  girl  drew  herself  up  with  a 
flash  of  pride,  a  pride  that  she  had  never 
"before  exhibited  in  intercourse  with  him, 
for  there  had  been  no  occasion  for  it. 

"  Why  do  you  ask?  "  she  cried  sharply. 
"  What  right " 

"The  right  of — "  the  man  burst  out 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

hotly,  and  then  stopped  and  bit  his  pale 
lip  until  the  blood  reddened  it.  "  No 
right,"  he  said  at  last,  humbly,  "  none 
whatever.  I  beg  your  pardon."  He 
passed  his  hand  wearily  across  his  brow  as 
if  to  drive  away  thought  by  the  mere  phys 
ical  pressure.  "  I  forgot  myself,"  he  add 
ed.  He  moved  back  a  few  paces  from 
her.  "  I  pray  your  pardon.  I  have  had 
much  on  my  mind  of  late.  I  have  become 
nervous,  overwrought,  unstrung " 

He  wondered  dimly  in  his  agony 
whether  he  had  completely  betrayed  him 
self  or  not.  His  distress  was  so  terrible 
that  the  girl  pitied  him. 

"  You  may  ask,"  she  said  finally.  "  I 
have  heard  something " 

She  looked  steadily  at  him.  How  like 
her  father  in  her  intent  gaze,  he  thought, 
as  he  returned  her  look  unflinchingly. 

"  I  have  heard  something  that  —  that 
disgraces  me." 

"  Miss  Chalden,"  he  cried  at  once, 
keenly  alive,  as  he  thought,  to  the  situa- 
[241] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 


tion,  "  say  no  more,  I  beg  of  you.  I  am 
no  fit  confidant  for  you.  Your  father,  your 
fiance  —  do  not  tell  me  anything  that  you 
would  regret." 

As  he  spoke  there  came  into  his  mind  a 
vivid  apprehension  that  she  had  learned 
the  secret  that  he  possessed,  that  Aunt 
Nancy  had  told  him,  and  from  his  soul  he 
pitied  her.  Yet,  in  that  he  was  a  human 
man  with  the  human  passions  of  his  kind, 
he  could  not  restrain  a  leap  of  wild  exulta 
tion  in  his  heart.  Had  she  discovered 
what  he  had  concealed  at  the  risk  of  his 
life,  could  she  be  made  to  recognize  the 
depth  of  his  love  in  his  self-sacrifice  for 
her?  He  fought  these  things  down  like 
the  gentleman  he  was.  He  strove  to  be 
conscious  only  of  the  fact  that  the  knowl 
edge  he  possessed,  if  she  shared  it,  would 
kill  her.  Perhaps  the  blow  had  already 
been  inflicted;  yet  there  was  not  quite  evi 
dence  enough  for  that  in  her  appearance. 
It  could  not  be  that,  surely.  It  was  only 
a  surmise  naturally  on  his  part,  but  still  a 
[  242] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

surmise.  There  might  be  other  dark  peri 
ods  in  the  hidden  life  of  Philip  Chalden, 
things  bad  enough,  but  beside  that  of  little 
moment.  He  must  be  careful.  He  must 
watch  himself.  The  man  clinched  his 
hands  once  more  and  waited. 

'  You  are  a  clergyman,"  said  Alicia 
slowly.  "  I  believe  you  to  be  an  honorable 
man.  Something  tells  me  that  —  that  — 
what  I  have  to  tell  you  is  already  known 
to  you." 

The  man  was  under  too  great  a  pressure 
for  any  mental  contradiction.  Something 
flashed  into  his  face,  sorrow  for  her,  joy 
for  himself.  The  girl  leaned  forward  and 
stared  at  him.  She  extended  her  hand 
toward  him. 

"  I  know  that  you  know,"  she  said  tri 
umphantly.  "  Don't  you?  You  shall  tell 
me!  "  she  continued,  her  voice  rising  a  lit 
tle.  ;'  Do  you  know  anything?" 

"  Stop,  stop !  "  he  answered,  putting  out 
his  hand. 

She  brushed  it  aside. 

[243] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  Do  you  know  anything  — "  her  voice 
lost  its  sweetness  in  its  commanding  insist 
ence  —  "  do  you  know  anything  about  my 
mother?  " 

The  man  shrank  away  from  her.  At 
this  moment  he  would  have  given  his  life 
cheerfully  to  spare  her.  He  tried  to  speak. 
His  voice  died  away  in  his  agony.  His 
lips  were  parched  and  dry.  He  moistened 
them  nervously,  turned  away  his  head,  and 
lied  to  her. 

"  No,"  he  whispered  hoarsely,  "  I " 

"  Don't  lie  to  me.  You  are  a  clergy 
man,  a  priest  of  God,  sworn  to  honor,  hon 
esty,  a  follower  in  your  Master's  footsteps. 
I  have  watched  you.  I  believe  you  to  be 
a  true  man,  one  of  the  few  with  whom  I 
have  come  in  contact.  Tell  me  the  truth. 
I  adjure  you  in  the  name  of  the  God  we 
both  serve,  do  you  know  any  —  disgrace 
ful  secret  —  about  —  my  mother?  " 

"  I  do,"  answered  the  man,  compelled, 
bowing  to  a  will  stronger  than  his  own; 
and  then  he  buried  his  face  in  his  thin, 
[244] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

slender  hands  and  his  body  shook  with 
suppressed  feeling. 

She  knew  then,  God  help  her,  he 
thought.  He  was  mistaken,  and  never 
was  mistake  more  fatal  in  its  consequences. 
As  yet  she  had  no  suspicion  of  the  real 
truth. 

''  Why,  why  did  you  ask  me?  "  he  cried, 
as  soon  as  he  could  speak.  "  Why  did 
you  force  me  to  tell  you?  Good  God, 
have  you  no  mercy,  no  pity  ?  I  have  known 
it  since  the  old  woman  died.  Believe  me, 
I  did  not  seek  the  knowledge.  She  saw 
that  I  —  I " 

What  was  the  Reverend  Henry  Olney 
about  to  say?  Before  her  surprised  yet 
suspicious  gaze  he  stopped.  By  an  effort 
that  tore  his  very  soul  he  checked  himself 
in  time. 

"  She  told  me.  I  swear  to  you  on  my 
honor  as  a  man,  by  my  vows  as  a  priest, 
that  I  never  told  it  to  a  soul  except  to  your 
father!  I  would  not  have  done  so.  You 
can't  think  how  awful  this  has  been  to  me. 
[245] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 


When  the  woman  told  me  it  opened  before 
me  such  a  vista  of  hope,  I  can't  express  it. 
But  there,  that  is  over." 

He  lifted  his  face  from  his  hands,  and 
the  haggardness  and  misery  in  it  more  than 
matched  her  own.  He  suffered  for  two  — 
for  Alicia  and  himself;  she  only  suffered 
for  herself,  then. 

"Forgive  me,"  he  went  on;  "I  have 
made  a  fool  of  myself.  I  do  not  know 
how  I  came  to  do  it.  The  knowledge  is 
awful  to  you,  but  —  well,  it  hasn't  made 
any  difference  in  your  regard  for  me,  I  see 
that,  and  I  thought,  I  hoped,  it  might  — 
if  you  ever  learned  it." 

The  girl  was  staring  at  the  man  wide- 
eyed,  astonished.  What  could  he  mean? 

"  I  saw  it  in  your  eyes  as  I  came  in,"  he 
continued  blindly.  "  I  watched  you.  For 
one  moment  I  hoped  —  but  that  is  over. 
I  want  to  serve  you  and  I  want  to  help 
you.  No  one  can  understand  your  posi 
tion  as  I." 

A  vague  fear  of  something  yet  unre- 
[246] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

vealed  and  more  terrible  had  penetrated 
the  girl's  soul  as  she  listened  to  the  passion 
ate  outburst.  Had  fate  something  worse 
in  store  for  her  than  the  blows  already  in 
flicted  upon  her? 

'You  understand?"  she  asked  slowly. 
"What  do  you  understand?  Why " 

"  I  understand,  yes,"  said  the  man; 
"  don't  you  see?  I  know." 

"Know  what?" 

"  My  mother  also " 

"  Was  she  an  adulteress,  a  suicide  like 
mine?  " 

"  She  was  an  adulteress,"  said  the  man 
bitterly,  "like  many  octoroons,  yes;  a  sui 
cide,  no." 

His  words  seemed  to  turn  the  girl  to 
stone.  She  stood  before  him  absolutely 
motionless.  An  octoroon  —  what  could 
he  mean?  She  was  staring  at  him,  and  the 
surprise  this  time  was  with  him.  She  did 
not  know,  she  had  not  known,  then.  Just 
heaven !  What  had  he  done  ?  What  had 
she  known  or  thought?  Had  he  betrayed 
[247] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

—  the  girl  was  speaking.  He  could  not 
hear  what  she  was  saying  even  at  the  dis 
tance  he  stood.  He  stepped  nearer  to  her. 
She  swayed  unsteadily  before  him.  He 
grasped  her  by  the  arm. 

"  An  octoroon !  "  she  whispered.  "  Was 
my  mother  a  —  negress  as  well  as " 

"  Good  God!  "  cried  Olney  in  a  voice 
tense  with  all  the  horror  of  the  discovery 
of  his  error,  "  didn't  you  know?  " 

"No.     Is  it  the  truth?" 

"  It's  a  lie,"  answered  the  man  prompt 
ly.  "  I  am  mad!  I  don't  know  what  I 
said." 

"  It's  the  truth !  "  cried  the  girl,  "  and 
I  am  even  as  you  —  tainted !  Black ! 
Black!  My  God!  My  God!  " 

"  Forgive  me,"  exclaimed  Olney  des 
perately,  falling  at  her  feet,  clutching  her 
dress  in  his  hand,  "  I  thought  you  knew. 
I  should  have  died  rather  than  —  what  am 
I  saying?  It's  a  lie !  I  know  nothing." 

'  You  love  me,"  said  the  girl  swiftly, 
"  and  you  know.  Aunt  Nancy  told  you. 
[248] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

It  made  me  like  yourself.  It  brought  me 
in  reach  of  you.  You  could  hope,  and  yet 
you  kept  silent  and  saw  me  give  myself  to 
another  man." 

"  No,"  persisted  the  man  doggedly,  "  I 
know  nothing." 

"An  octoroon!  —  Oh,  not  that!  Yes, 
say  it  was  a  lie,  a  lie !  "  cried  Alicia  in  a 
heart-breaking  appeal.  "  Why,  my  mother 
was  as  white  as  — "  she  was  about  to  say 
as  I  am  — "  as  any  woman.  She  was 
wicked,  disgraceful,  she  abandoned  me, 
she  ran  away  from  my  father,  with  his 
dearest  friend.  He  shot  the  man  dead, 
and  my  mother  committed  suicide  and  left 
me  a  baby,  a  little  white  baby.  She  was 
an  adulteress,  she  was  everything  that  she 
should  not  have  been  —  oh,  for  God's 
sake,  don't  say  she  was  a  negress !  " 

The  girl  was  wild  with  terror  now. 
She  looked  down  at  the  man  kneeling  at 
her  feet  and  stretched  out  her  hands  to 
him. 

"  Don't  tell  me  that!  "  she  cried. 
[249] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  I  will  not,"  said  the  man,  resolutely 
persistent,  hoping  against  hope  that  he 
might  undo  his  betrayal,  rectify  his  awful 
mistake.  "  What  you  have  said  is  true, 
and  that's  all  of  it.  Your  mother  was 
white,  of  course.  That's  what  old  Nancy 
told  me.  I  lied  to  you  a  moment  ago.  I 
tried  to  make  you  believe  that  you  were 
even  as  I  —  that  I  might  hope  —  that  I 
might  love  you  —  that  you  might  return 
my  affection.  I  worship  the  ground  upon 
which  you  walk.  I  lay  my  soul  at  your 
feet.  It  has  been  there  ever  since  I  saw 
you.  I  am  a  man,  that  accursed  streak  of 
black  blood  has  not  altered  me,  changed 
me,  and  but  for  that  I  might  have  won 
you.  At  least  I'd  have  had  a  chance  like 
other  men.  It  made  me  crazy,  and  I  gave 
way  to  the  temptation  just  now.  Hate  me, 
despise  me,  I  have  lied  to  you,  I  am  a  for 
sworn  man.  I  have  been  false  to  my  ordi 
nation  vows,  my  honor  as  a  man  —  to 
everything!  I  have  thrown  them  aside  for 
you." 

[250] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 


And  so  he  had,  but  in  a  different  way 
from  that  conveyed  in  his  speech. 

"  No,  no,"  said  the  girl,  overwhelmed 
by  her  consciousness  of  the  bitter  truth, 
"  you  are  telling  an  untruth  now.  I  know 
you,  even  despite  yourself."  His  heart 
leaped  with  joy  at  the  testimony  to  his 
rectitude  that  she  had  unconsciously  given 
him.  "  I  know  you  better  than  yourself," 

she  went  on.      "  She  was  a  negress,   and 
j " 

"  Oh,  do  not,"  he  interrupted  in  a  last 
appeal.  "  Dismiss  all  this  from  your  mind. 
The  fault  is  mine.  Would  God  I  had  died 
before  I  came  here!  " 

"  And  would  God  that  I  might  now  if 
it  be  true !  " 

"  It  is  not.     I  swear  to  you " 

"  Stop !  Do  not  perjure  yourself  fur 
ther.  I  am  going  to  one  who  knows,  from 
whom  I  can  get  the  truth." 

"And  that  is?" 

"My  father!" 

[251] 


XV 

THE  big  clock  in  the  office  was  just 
striking  twelve.  Philip  Chalden  had 
been  waiting  all  morning  for  the  blow  to 
fall,  and  upon  the  mid-day  stroke  of  the 
clock  it  came.  Alicia  entered  the  office 
without  ceremony  of  any  sort.  He  had 
carried  in  his  mind  all  morning  her  miser 
able  face,  which,  in  spite  of  her  efforts  to 
be  cheerful,  had  been  so  heart-broken,  but 
the  sorrow  he  had  seen  and  remembered 
was  nothing  to  the  anguish  that  appeared 
on  her  countenance  now. 

With  scrupulous  care  she  closed  the 
heavy  doors  that  barred  the  way  to  the 
private  room  in  which  he  sat.  They  were 
double,  and  so  arranged  as  effectually  to 
conceal  whatever  went  on  inside  that  room. 
Not  a  sound  could  penetrate  through  them 
to  the  other  side  of  the  partition.  There 
were  many  things  that  happened  in  that 
[252] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

office  that  Philip  Chalden  would  not  have 
allowed  anyone  to  hear.  The  father  and 
daughter  were  as  alone,  so  far  as  sight  and 
hearing  were  concerned,  as  if  they  had  been 
in  a  desert. 

"  Alicia,"  exclaimed  Chalden,  as  the  girl 
stood  and  looked  at  him  with  a  burning, 
awful  glance.  ''  What  is  the  matter? 
What  has  brought  you  here?  Has  any 
thing  happened?  " 

The  girl's  hand  went  to  her  throat. 
She  struggled  for  a  moment,  and  then  she 
gasped  out,  in  a  voice  which  was  so  filled 
with  suffering  and  so  foreign  to  her  usual 
speech  that  had  her  auditor  been  blind  he 
could  have  marked  her  agony: 

"Was  my  mother  a  negress?" 

The  question  was  so  unexpected,  so  di 
rect,  that  it  stunned  him.  Alicia  read  her 
doom  sentence  in  the  look  that  leaped  into 
his  eye,  the  nervous  shudder  that  shook  his 
frame.  He  strove  as  never  before  to  col 
lect  himself,  to  think  of  some  reply  which 
would  avoid  confession. 

[253] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  Answer  1  My  God,  last  night  you  told 
me  that  she  was  only  an  adulteress,  that 
was  a  lie !  I  want  the  truth  now !  That 
woman's  baby  that  she  abandoned?  It 
died?" 

He  knew  that  he  was  beaten.  He  was 
compelled  to  answer  by  the  girl's  imperi 
ous,  insistent  demand.  The  time  for  lies 
had  gone  —  only  the  truth  could  pass  cur 
rent  now. 

'  That  baby  died?  "  she  insisted. 

He  bowed  his  head. 

"When?" 

"  Almost  immediately." 

"  Ah,  would  God  I  had  been  she!  " 

"  Alicia  — "  began  the  old  man. 

"  Don't  touch  me.  Don't  come  near 
me!  My  mother?" 

"She  was  my  wife's  maid  —  an  —  oc 
toroon;  she  had  been  in  our  family  from 
childhood.  Her  forebears  had  been  my 
father's  slaves.  There  was  good  blood  in 
her  veins  —  our  own.  The  —  other  baby 

died  in  Italy.    I  —  she " 

[254] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


The  man  hung  his  head.  For  the  first 
time  in  his  life  he  could  not  look  enemy 
or  friend  in  the  face.  The  sweat  stood 
out  on  his  forehead.  Alicia  gazed  piti 
lessly. 

"The  other  baby?" 

4  You  were  born  a  few  months  after  her 
death.  And  —  ah  —  your  mother  died 
when  you  were  born." 

"  Had  you  married  her?  " 

"  Married  an  oc — "  cried  Chalden,  and 
then  he  stopped. 

"  I  see,"  said  Alicia,  "  being  a  white 
man  you  could  not  marry  a  woman  like 
my  —  my  mother.  What  is  my  name?  " 

"  Avery  is  mine." 

"But  mine?" 

"  Alicia,  Alicia !  "  groaned  the  man, 
"  why  do  you  press  me  this  way?  " 

"  I  have  no  right  to  your  name;  I  sup 
pose  I  might  be  called  after  my  mother." 

'  They  were  slaves  in  my  father's  fam 
ily.  They  called  themselves  Avery." 

"Why  didn't  you  tell  me?  Why,  in 
[255] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

God's  name,  did  you  pass  me  off  as  a  white 
woman?    As  your  child?  " 

"  You  were  my  child." 

"  Yes,  I  know,  but  as  your  lawful  child. 
Why  did  you  bring  me  up  as  a  white 
woman  only  that  I  should  learn  what  I  am 
now?  You  didn't  love  me.  I  can't  re 
member  in  all  my  life  that  you  ever  showed 
the  least  affection  for  me  until  after  I 
graduated." 

"  Alicia,  I  love  you  now." 

"  Yes,  but  not  before.  Why  did  you 
doit?" 

"  My  God!  "  gasped  the  man.  "  You 
kill  me  with  your  questions!  " 

"I  must  have  an  answer!  It's  my 
right." 

"  I  hated  society.  After  the  death  of 
my  —  my  wife,  and  the  killing  of  my 
friend,  I  wanted  to  get  away  from  it.  I 
had  loved  that  woman " 

"My  mother?" 

"  No,  no,  the  other  woman,  my  wife." 
.  Alicia  shrank  as  if  from  a  blow. 
[256] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  I  loved  her,  as  I  told  you  last  night, 
more  than  my  very  soul,  and  when  she  be 
trayed  me,  and  with  my  best  friend  whom 
I  had  trusted,  I  went  mad.  You  will  have 
the  truth.  I  became  a  human  brute,  an 
animal.  I  took  the  baby  and  Nancy  and 
Alice  away  with  me." 

"  Alice?  This  other  woman,  my  moth 
er " 

"  Yes,  yes.  She  was  beautiful  in  her 
own  way  —  you  know  the  rest." 

"  And  this  is  my  father?  " 

"  You  would  have  the  story,"  he  went 
on  desperately,  his  only  possible  hope  being 
in  making  a  clean  breast  of  it  now.  "  I 
brought  you  up  in  ignorance  of  your  birth. 
I  wanted  to  use  you  as  my  revenge  against 
society.  To  make  you  as  wise  as  you  were 
beautiful,  as  wealthy  as  you  were  wise.  I 
thought  that  you  would  be  a  success  from 
the  beginning.  I  wanted  to  marry  you  to 
the  best  and  highest  in  the  land,  and  then 
—  well,  I  don't  know  what  then.  I  in 
tended  to  use  you  as  my  jest,  but  I  did  not 
[  257] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

in  the  end.  Because  I  began  to  love  you.  I 
am  frank,  I  am  telling  you  the  truth  now. 
I  tried  to  think  otherwise,  but  in  vain. 
When  you  had  scarlet  fever  I  was  nearly 
frantic  lest  you  should  die.  I  tried  to  make 
myself  believe  that  it  was  because  I  feared 
to  lose  my  —  my  revenge  on  society.  I 
know  now  it  wasn't  that.  I  loved  you. 
Since  you  have  returned  from  college  and 
we  have  been  thrown  together  —  Alicia, 
Alicia,  I  didn't  love  my  wife  of  long  ago 
as  I  love  you  now. 

"  Don't  shrink  away  from  me  !  You  are 
all  I  have.  I've  won  the  world,  I  can  buy 
what  I  please,  but  there  isn't  a  single  thing 
on  earth  that  loves  me,  unless  you  will  for 
give  me.  Think  of  me.  I  was  horribly 
treated.  I  was  mad.  I  was  stricken  in 
everything  that  men  hold  most  dear.  I 
was  a  brute,  an  animal,  a  fiend,  a  devil, 
call  me  what  you  will!  But  now  I  am  dif 
ferent.  I  am  ashamed.  Alicia,  I'm  your 
father.  I  have  not  been  good  to  you,  but 
I  will  make  up  to  you  now.  I  love  you. 
[258] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

You  don't  know  how  rich  I  am,  how  able 
I  am.  I  want  to  make  reparation.  You 
wouldn't  realize  if  I  told  you,  but  I  — 
we  have  money  enough  to  buy  anything 
under  heaven.  You  and  Doctor  Why- 
ot " 

"  He  is  nothing  to  me  now.  I  could  not 
marry  him.  I  can  never  marry  any  man 
on  the  face  of  God's  earth." 

"Why  not?     I  have  the  material  pow 
ers  of  the  world  at   my  —  at  your  com 
mand.     I  can  make  you  a  duchess,  a  prin 
cess.     I  might  even  buy  you  a  throne." 
'  You  cannot  make  me  a  white  woman." 

"  You  are  white  now.  Just  a  trace 
of " 

"  Just  what  Mr.  Olney  has." 

"  The  infernal  hound !  "  cried  her 
father.  "  He  must  have  told  you !  He 
broke  his  word!  " 

"  He  could  not  help  it.     He  came  to  see 

me  this  morning.    He  saw  I  was  in  trouble. 

I  told  him.    You  gave  me  the  clew  last 

night  when  you  asked  me  if  he  had  told 

[  259  ] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

me  the  other.  I  told  what  I  had  learned 
about  my  mother,  and  then  it  all  came  out. 
He  is  innocent." 

'  The  black  scoundrel !  "  he  exclaimed. 

"I  would  like " 

"  Stop !    What  you  call  him  you  call  me. 
We  are  alike." 

'  Well,  suppose  he  does  know,"  plead 
ed  her  father.  "  I  can  buy  his  silence 
nr " 

\J  L 

'  You  mistake  him.  He  wouldn't  tell. 
Tortures  could  not  wring  it  from  him,  but 
if  it  were  proper  for  him  to  proclaim  it 
you  could  not  buy  his  silence  and  you  could 
not  force  it.  Perhaps  that's  his  black 
honor.  There  are  some  things  that  your 
money  can't  buy." 

"  I  have  not  found  them." 

"  Then  I'll  tell  you  what  they  are.  One 
is  self-respect.  To  pass  myself  off  for  a 
white  woman  for  another  day  —  I  would 
rather  die!  It  is  not  my  fault  that  I  am 
black.  I  could  not  help  it.  It's  yours; 
but  that  I  should  exist  a  false  pretence  an- 
[260] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 


other  moment,  I  shall  not  do  it!  Why, 
as  I  rode  down  in  the  carriage  I  wanted  to 
scream  at  the  top  of  my  voice,  '  I'm  black, 
I'm  black!  '  The  hoofs  of  the  horses  beat 
out  the  words  on  the  pavement.  The  peo 
ple  who  looked  at  me  seemed  to  be  crying 
it  in  my  face " 

"Oh,  God!"  cried  the  old  man,  ap 
palled  at  this  display  of  frantic  passion, 
although  her  voice  scarcely  rose  above  its 
ordinary  tones. 

"  Everybody  shall  know  it!  I  will  con 
ceal  it  no  longer  from  anyone.  The  truth 
shall  be  known,  the  truth  that  kills  me, 
and  shames  you.  All  the  money  and  power 
on  earth  could  not  make  me  love  you. 
There  is  one  other  thing  you  cannot  buy." 

"What  is  that?" 

"  Love,"  said  the  girl;  "  I  hate  you,  I 
loathe  you !  I  do  not  know  where  I  get 
the  power  to  feel  this  way.  My  mother 
was  an  ex-slave,  my  father  is  a  liar,  a  brute, 
a  blackguard!  Why  should  I  care?  " 

She  flung  the  mordant  words  at  him  in 
[261] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

a  quiet,  low  voice  that  cut  him  like  a  lash, 
such  contempt  there  was  in  them. 

"  With  such  an  ancestry  I  ought  to  be 
willing  to  take  anything,  to  do  anything, 
disgraceful.  I  ought  to  allow  you  to  buy 
me  title,  fame,  place,  and  race,  and  I 
ought  to  appreciate  a  character  like  yours. 
But  I  don't;  I  despise  you,  I  curse  God 
that  you  are  my  father,  and  if  I  have 
power  I  shall  never  look  upon  your  face 
again.  You  have  had  your  revenge,  not 
on  society,  but  on  me,  a  woman,  with  your 
own  blood  in  my  veins,  a  woman  who  had 
learned  to  love  you,  who  has  lain  on  your 
breast,  whom  you  called  daughter.  There 
is  no  depth  of  hatred  so  deep  that  you  do 
not  fill  it  in  my  eyes.  That's  all.  I  am 
going  now." 

"  Don't,  don't!  "  cried  the  man.  "  All 
that  you  say  is  true.  But  give  me  another 
chance!  I  have  been  bad,  you  can  make 
me  better.  I  was  good  once,  you  can  bring 
it  out  again.  I  will  tell  the  truth,  mine  be 
the  shame,  yours  the  honor;  we  will  go 
[262] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

away  together.  All  that  I  have  is  yours  — 
no,  not  to  buy  you,  but  for  yourself  to  do 
what  you  will,  to  do  good  with.  Bear  with 
me.  It  won't  be  for  long.  This  will  kill 
me.  Have  mercy!" 

"  I  am  going  now,"  she  returned  monot 
onously,  as  deaf  to  his  appeal  as  if  he  had 
not  spoken. 

"  Where  are  you  going?  " 
'  To  my  own  people !  " 

"Alicia!     Alicia!" 

She  wrenched  herself  from  his  detain 
ing  hands,  flung  open  the  door,  and  in  a 
moment  she  was  gone. 


[263] 


XVI 

IT  was  half  after  one  o'clock  before 
Doctor  Whyot's  buggy  dashed  up  to 
the  steps  of  the  Loyal  Club.  He  had  not 
been  able  to  leave  the  case  which  had  so 
inopportunely  demanded  his  services  until 
a  few  moments  before.  He  felt  that  he 
had  given  enough  evidence  of  his  devotion 
to  science  in  his  morning  sacrifice,  and  reso 
lutely  postponing  attendance  upon  other 
calls,  more  or  less  pressing,  he  had  driven 
post-haste  to  the  club. 

In  that  rapid  drive,  and  so  far  as  he 
could  during  the  conduct  of  the  case,  he 
had  formed  his  plan.  He  intended  to  show 
Alicia's  letter  to  the  Major,  to  beg  him  as 
a  gentleman  to  look  at  the  situation  from 
the  younger  man's  point  of  view.  That, 
whereas,  before  it  had  been  a  case  of  love, 
it  had  now  become  a  question  of  honor  as 
[264] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

well.  He  hoped  the  Major  would  see 
things  as  he  did  and  that  he  would  not  only 
withdraw  his  opposition  to  the  marriage, 
but  would  actually  join  him  in  pleading 
with  Alicia. 

Whyot  had  made  no  mistake  about  the 
letter.  He  knew,  as  no  one  else  did,  the 
strength  of  Alicia's  character.  Here  was 
no  declaration  of  an  overwrought,  hysteri 
cal  woman  who  wanted  to  be  coaxed.  Her 
firmness  and  intensity  of  purpose  spoke  to 
him  in  the  letter.  He  realized  that  he 
would  have  to  fight,  and  fight  desperately, 
for  her  love,  and  he  intended  to  crave,  nay, 
to  demand,  the  assistance  of  the  Major. 
He  was  not  indifferent  to  the  shock  of  the 
declaration,  he  was  just  as  proud  in  his 
way  as  his  uncle  was  in  his  of  his  clean 
ancestry,  and  was  just  as  grieved  at  the 
revelation  Alicia  made  to  him  as  anyone 
could  have  been.  He  was  a  just  man, 
though  he  was  wildly  in  love.  It  made  a 
difference  to  him,  but  the  difference,  after 
all,  was  trifling.  He  told  himself  that  he 
[265] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

did  not  care  what  she  was,  what  her  an 
cestry  —  which  was  not  true,  but  it  was  a 
good  enough  theory  upon  which  to  work. 

The  Major  received  him  with  rather 
more  warmth  than  usual.  It  was  some 
days  since  he  had  seen  his  nephew,  to  whom 
he  was  devotedly  attached,  and  of  whom 
he  was  secretly  proud,  even  of  his  success 
in  his  profession.  If  he  would  be  a  doc 
tor,  the  Major  was  glad  that  he  was  a 
good  one,  and  the  old  man  sorrowfully 
marked  the  pain  and  agitation  on  his  neph 
ew's  face.  His  greeting,  therefore,  was 
distinctly  cordial. 

"  William  Penn,"  he  began  —  the  Ma 
jor  always  began  all  conversations  in  which 
he  took  part;  it  was  due  him  to  take  the 
initiative,  and  he  always  took  it  —  "  Will 
iam  Penn,  you  look  troubled.  What's  the 
matter?  You  have  been  working  too 
hard." 

"  Yes,  Uncle  Anthony,  I  have  just  han 
dled  a  difficult  case." 

"  Were  you  successful  with  it?  " 
[266] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  I  think  so.  Yes,  the  woman  is  doing 
well  and  —  but,  sir,  that  is  not  what  I 
wanted  —  I  —  Uncle  Anthony,  I  come  to 
appeal  to  you,  and  first  of  all  I  will  ask 
you  to  read  that." 

"  That  "  was  Alicia's  letter.  The  Ma 
jor  put  on  his  eye-glasses  and  read  it  care 
fully.  His  nephew  noticed  that  he  mani 
fested  no  surprise  at  the  contents. 

"  Um  — "  he  said,  handing  it  back. 

'  You  do  not  seem  surprised,  Uncle." 

"  I  am  not." 

"Why  not?" 

"  I  knew  it  all  yesterday." 

"You  knew  it?" 

'  Yes.  A  blackmailing  scoundrel  came 
to  me  yesterday  morning  and  told  me  the 
story.  I  went  at  once  to  Mr.  Chalden  and 
told  him." 

"You  went  to  him?" 

"Yes,   and,  William  Penn  Whyot,   let 

me  say  to  you  right  now,  and  I  don't  want 

you  to  insinuate,  even  in  your  mind,  that 

I  went  there  with  any  object  of  —  er  — 

[267] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

checking  the  raid  which  I  am  informed 
Mr.  Chalden  had  inaugurated  on  my  stock 
in  the  —  ah " 

"  Uncle  Anthony,  I  know  you  too  well 
to  dream  for  a  moment  that  you  would 
think  of  such  a  thing." 

"  Precisely.  It  takes  a  gentleman  to 
appreciate  a  gentleman.  As  to  that  letter, 
I  call  it  a  very  proper  letter  indeed.  The 
young  lady  has  shown  herself  to  be  pos 
sessed  of  —  er  —  the  instincts  of  —  ah  — 
good  society.  She  has  my  respect  and  ad 
miration  for  her  resolute  and  —  er  —  he 
roic  action." 

"  I  am  glad  to  hear  you  say  that,  for  it 
makes  my  request  easier  for  you  to  grant." 

"  What  is  your  request,  sir?  " 

"  I  want  you  to  go  with  me  immediately 
to  her  father  and  formally  ask  of  him  the 
honor  of  his  daughter's  hand  in  marriage." 

"  What!  "  gasped  out  the  little  Major. 
"  Marriage  to  me?  " 

"  Of  course  not,  marriage  to  me.  Then, 
when  we  have  received  his  consent,  I  want 
[268] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

you  to  go  with  me  to  Alicia  and  add  your 
pleas  to  mine." 

"  Why,  damn  it!  "  cried  the  Major,  "  I 
told  Chalden  yesterday  that  the  marriage 
had  been  bad  enough  before,  but  now  it 
was  impossible.  Not  only  are  they  people 
with  whom  we  cannot  afford  to  ally  our 
selves,  but  —  ah  —  the  girl's  ancestry  is 
not  even  respectable!  I  feel  rather  sorry 
for  Chalden,  but  that  doesn't  alter  the  case 
one  bit." 

"  Nevertheless,  Uncle,  you  must  go  with 
me." 

"  Preposterous,  sir!  " 

"  I  tell  you,  sir,  that  it  was  a  matter  of 
love  alone  before,  now  it  is  a  matter  of 
honor,  in  addition.  I  value  our  family 
more  than  you  think,  sir,  but,  after  all,  I 
am  not  marrying  the  girl  for  her  ancestry. 
I  tell  you,  I  know  her !  There  doesn't  live 
a  nobler,  purer,  better  woman  on  the  face 
of  the  earth  !  " 

"  Stop !  "  cried  the  Major;  "  that's  what 
they  all  say." 

[269] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  This  letter  proves  it.  She  didn't  wait 
a  moment  to  set  me  free." 

"  She  knows  you  won't  accept." 

"  She  honors  me  if  she  believes  that.  I 
do  not  deny  that  it  makes  a  difference,  but 
it  doesn't  dimmish  my  affection  for  her, 
and  it  binds  her  to  me  with  the  claims  of 
sorrow  and  trouble.  Uncle,  I  appeal  to 
you.  You  are  nice  on  the  point  of  honor. 
I  know  of  no  man  more  tender  on  the 
question  of  honor  and  duty.  I  am  a  man 
of  full  age,  accustomed  to  think  for  my 
self,  with  the  responsibilities  of  my  pro 
fession  before  me.  It  is  my  solemn  con 
viction  that  it  is  my  duty,  as  it  is  my 
happiness,  to  insist  upon  this  engagement 
and  to  marry  this  girl." 

"  Suppose  it  comes  out?  " 

"  Let  it  come.  No  one  will  dare  ques 
tion  the  status  of  my  wife.  She'll  be  one 
of  us,  a  Whyot,  then,"  he  smiled  faintly. 
'  You  must  help  me.  As  a  gentleman,  sir, 
I  appeal  to  you.  Your  course  toward 
Chalden,  I  have  heard  of  it  from  Mr.  Bul- 
[270] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 


don,  was  noble,  magnanimous  to  the  point 
of  Quixotism.  You  had  him  in  your 
power,  you  spared  him  when  you  hated 
him.  Match  that  action  with  another. 
Oh,  be  moved!  Shake  off  this  prejudice 
of  race  that  sometimes,  I  think,  has  para 
lyzed  the  energies  of  our  latest  genera 
tions  " 

"  William  Penn,"  interrupted  the  Ma 
jor  warningly. 

He  was  strangely  swayed  by  the  young 
man's  appeal,  and  his  nephew,  seeing  that, 
would  not  be  stayed. 

'  Think  of  that  poor  girl.  Think  of 
her  alone  with  Chalden.  Think  of  her  life 
with  the  consciousness  of  this,"  putting  the 
paper  before  the  Major  again,  "  canker 
ing  in  her  soul !  As  you  are  a  gentleman, 
nay,  a  man,  as  you  have  loved  me,  indulge 
me  in  this.  Go  with  me.  Let  us  see  Mr. 
Chalden,  and,  backed  by  his  consent,  let  us 
go  to  Alicia.  It  all  depends  upon  you. 
You  represent  that  for  which  Alicia  has 
drawn  back.  You  are,  as  it  were,  the  voice 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

of  society  to  her,  and  when  you  speak  it 
will  have  weight.  I  tell  you  frankly  that 
if  I  go  alone  I  know  what  the  answer  will 
be.  I  shall  be  unable  to  shake  her  resolu 
tion,  but  with  you,  I  feel,  I  do  believe  — 
I  have  no  assurance,  but  I  hope  —  and 
aside  from  all  this,  I  love  her.  Didn't  you 
ever  feel  yourself,  when  you  were  younger, 
a  passion  for  a  woman  that  consumed  you, 
that  made  you  think  that  life  without  her 
would  be  useless?  I  do  not  wish  to  inflict 
upon  you  these  things,  but  I  love  her,  I 
tell  you !  I  do  not  care  what  she  is,  or 
from  what  she  comes,  her  people,  anything 
—  I  know  only  that  I  love  her!  She  has 
grown  into  my  heart,  she  is  bound  up  in 
my  life.  I  am  asking  you  for  everything 
that  man  holds  dear,  by  our  relationship, 
by  your  love  and  affection  for  me,  by  the 
honorable  instincts  of  our  race,  to  help  me. 
Will  you  do  it?" 

"  By  Jove !  "   cried  the   Major,  wiping 
his  glasses  suspiciously,  "it  is  against  my 
principles.     I  think  just  as  I  always  have, 
[272] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

but,  by  gad,  William  Penn,  I  will!  You 
have  the  good  Whyot  blood  in  you,  after 
all.  Honor,  even  family  prestige,  must 
give  way  to  it.  The  girl's  done  nobly.  I 
will  help  you  win  her,  and  together  we 
will  protect  her.  Society  in  Philadelphia 
takes  its  cue  from  me.  When  she  marries 
you  she  becomes  a  Whyot,  and  she's  beau 
tiful  enough,  and,  if  that  letter  indicates 
her  character,  good  enough,  to  be  allowed 
the  title." 

That  was  a  great  concession  on  the  part 
of  the  Major. 

"  Thank  you,"  said  William  Penn  grate 
fully.  "  Now,  let  us  go  at  once." 

"  Dismiss  your  buggy,"  said  the  Major, 
"  and  we  will  take  my  coupe." 

As  the  two  men  descended  the  steps  of 
the  club  the  doctor's  messenger  boy  came 
running  toward  them  with  a  note. 

"  It   came,"    he   said,    "  to  your    office, 

brought  by  Miss  Chalden's  man.    He  said 

she  said  you  were  to  get  it  at  once  wherever 

you  were.     I  thought  you  would  be  here, 

[273] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

for  I  heard  you  say  you  were  going  to  meet 
Major  Whyot,  sir." 

"  Very  good,  Bob,"  said  the  doctor 
lightly,  taking  the  letter.  "  Run  back  to 
the  office  and  tell  anyone  who  comes  in  that 
I  will  endeavor  to  return  by,  say,  four 
o'clock,  ready  for  duty.  Come,  Uncle." 

As  the  two  men  got  into  the  cab,  Whyot, 
with  an  apology  to  the  older  man,  opened 
the  note.  It  was  scribbled  on  a  piece  of 
Chalden's  office  paper  in  a  hand  the  trem 
bling  characters  of  which  suggested  a  heart 
breaking.  Alicia  had  stopped  in  the  outer 
office,  at  that  time  practically  empty,  most 
of  the  clerks  being  at  luncheon,  and  had 
written  her  lover  a  hasty  note.  And  thus 
it  ran: 

"  What  I  wrote  you  last  night  was  a  lie. 
I  did  not  know  it.  This  morning  I  have 
learned  the  truth.  I  was  not  that  baby 
that  was  left.  My  mother  was  an  octo 
roon,  the  child  of  a  slave.  She  was  not 
married  to  my  father.  Philip  Chalden 
[274] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

is  he.  I  am  a  black  woman.  This  ends  it 
all.  I  knew  you  would  come,  after  the 
other  letter,  to  plead  with  me.  Now  you 
must  not.  I  could  not  bear  to  look  at  you 
across  the  gulf  that  separates  us.  And 
though  I  am  a  child  of  infamy,  of  shame, 
such  as  I  never  thought,  yet  I  beg  you 
to  believe  one  thing.  That  is,  I  love  you 
as  if  I  were  the  purest,  the  noblest,  the  best 
of  women.  Oh,  Will,  Will,  it  is  all 
summed  up  in  this  hideous  confession,  I 
am  a  black  woman  —  beneath  you.  For 
get  me. 

"  Alicia." 

As  they  rattled  down  Chestnut  Street, 
the  Major,  struck  by  the  long  silence, 
turned  to  look  at  his  nephew.  At  first 
sight  he  thought  the  doctor  had  fainted. 

"What's  the  matter?  What  has  hap 
pened?" 

He  shook  the  younger  man. 

"Is  she  dead?" 

"  Would  God  she  were!  Read  that!  " 
[275] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  My  God !  My  God !  "  whispered  the 
Major,  staring  stupidly  at  the  letter  after 
he  had  mastered  its  contents. 

Then  he  looked  anxiously  at  his  nephew, 
and  the  question,  "  What  shall  you  do 
now?  "  died  from  his  lips. 


[276] 


XVII 

«  T\  T  R.  CHALDEN,"  cried  William 
JLV JL  Penn  Whyot,  unceremoniously 
bursting  into  the  room,  brushing  aside  all 
pretence  at  announcement,  leaving  a  star 
tled  clerk  behind  him,  "  read  that  and  tell 
what  it  means!  " 

The  Major,  who  followed  the  doctor, 
carefully  closed  the  door.  Chalden  had 
not  stirred  from  his  position  before  the  big 
desk  since  Alicia  had  left  him  two  hours 
before.  He  surmised,  especially  when  he 
saw  the  Major,  that  they  had  come  to  him 
about  the  Jackens  story.  He  was  not  quite 
prepared,  therefore,  for  Alicia's  letter. 
He  had  been  so  shaken  that  morning,  how- 
over,  that  the  limit  of  endurance  seemed 
to  have  been  reached  and  further  blows 
only  fell  harmlessly  upon  a  dulled,  indif 
ferent  consciousness.  He  stared  at  the  let 
ter  a  long  time.  Alicia  had  been  prompt, 
[277] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

she  had  not  waited.  How  many  traits  she 
had  that  he  possessed,  that  he  gloried  in  I 
What  qualities  she  was  mistress  of !  What 
a  woman  she  was,  what  she  might  have 
been  —  if  —  if  —  only 

"  Well,  sir,"  cried  the  doctor's  voice, 
breaking  in  abruptly  upon  his  thoughts. 

It  was  so  harsh,  so  strained,  so  unnatural, 
that  the  Major  started  in  surprise. 

"  I  have  nothing  to  say,"  answered  the 
financier  dully,  handing  back  the  letter. 

"Nothing  to  say!"  cried  the  doctor. 
"  That  damned  lie!  You  don't  admit  it? 
It  isn't  true?" 

41  It  is  the  truth." 

Whyot  had  approached  nearer  to  Chal- 
den.  He  stood  close  by  his  side,  one  hand 
upon  the  desk,  looking  down  at  the  man. 
As  he  heard  him  admit  the  truth,  he  drew 
back  his  right  hand  and  with  the  quickness 
of  his  old  college  days  he  struck  the  older 
man  fair  in  the  mouth.  The  blow  cut 
Chalden's  lip,  and  a  thin  stream  of  blood 
trickled  down  his  gray  beard. 
[278] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

"William  Perm!"  cried  the  horrified 
Major,  springing  to  his  side  and  catching 
the  arm  of  the  young  man  as  it  was  lifted 
to  strike  another  blow. 

"  Let  him  alone,"  said  Chalden,  "  no 
one  can  insult  me  now.  I  deserve  it. 
Strike  again  for  —  Alicia's  —  sake." 

His  words  came  brokenly.  He  had 
been  mistaken  when  he  fancied  that  the 
limit  of  his  endurance  had  been  sounded. 
He  had  quivered  under  Alicia's  contempt, 
but  he  responded  again  to  Whyot's  blow. 
A  proud  man  and  a  strong  had  been  Philip 
Chalden.  When  the  proud  and  the  strong 
break,  the  tragedy  is  appalling.  The  man 
was  broken.  But  one  thing  remained  to 
him.  He  knew  no  other,  no  better  way. 

"  Listen,"  he  said  hopelessly.  "  I  am 
rich.  I  do  not  know  what  my  fortune  is. 
Two  hundred  millions,  anything  I  want  to 
make  it.  I  offered  it  all  to  Alicia.  She 
threw  it  back  in  my  face.  Don't  get  in 
sulted.  You  have  done  all  you  can  already 
to  break  me.  I  offer  it  to  you.  The  girl 

[279] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

is  beautiful.  She  is  well  educated;  her 
principles  are  not  mine.  There  is  no  trace 
perceptible  of  her  mother's  blood  in  her. 
She  is  a  woman  to  be  honored  by  the 
noblest  and  best.  For  God's  sake,  take 
her,  and  everything  with  her!  " 

There  was  a  passion  in  his  appeal,  a 
touch  of  his  old-time  fire,  and  it  was  the 
motive  that  robbed  the  proposition  of  its 
mercenary,  its  degrading  character.  It 
was  for  Alicia,  and  for  Alicia  they  could 
forgive  him.  And  William  Penn  loved 
her,  too,  never  as  at  that  moment.  The 
Major  looked  at  his  nephew,  his  heart  in 
his  mouth.  What  would  his  reply  be? 

"  Could  you  bribe  her?  "  questioned  the 
doctor. 

"  No,"  said  Chalden,  "  I  could  not." 

That  was  his  answer.     He  realized  it. 

"Where  is  she?"  cried  the  younger 
man. 

"  I  do  not  know." 

"  Is  she  at  home?" 

"  I  think  not." 

[280] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

"  Where  did  she  say  she  was  going?  " 

"  To  her  own  people." 

"  And  where  may  that  be?  " 

Chalden  shook  his  head.  "  I  do  not 
know." 

"  Who  told  her  this  awful  story?  " 

"  Olney." 

"What!" 

"  Yes.  An  old  black  nurse  of  mine  told 
him,  and  he  betrayed  it.  Alicia  forced 
him  to  tell  it  by  pretending  to  know  this 
other  story.  She  says  he  is  innocent." 

"  I  can  well  believe  it,"  cried  Whyot; 
"I  know  the  man.  By  heavens,  that's 
where  she's  gone !  He's  in  love  with  her. 
What  can  have  happened?" 

A  fierce  pang  of  jealousy,  to  which  he 
had  hitherto  been  a  stranger,  tore  through 
Whyot's  heart  at  the  thoughts  that  came 
to  him  then.  "  Her  own  people."  That 
meant  Olney.  She  could  not  go  to  him 
except  —  just  heaven ! 

"  We  must  save  her!  "  he  cried,  "  from 
herself.  Come,  Uncle,  and  you,"  he  added 
[281] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

roughly,  shaking  Chalden  by  the  shoulder. 
"  You  must  come,  too  —  to  see  the  end 
of  it." 

Chalden  rose  to  his  feet  mechanically, 
and,  as  he  stood  bewildered,  the  little  Ma 
jor  in  a  sudden  access  of  charity  handed 
him  his  hat  and  overcoat. 

"  You  are  an  infernal  scoundrel,"  he 
whispered,  as  he  helped  the  broken  old 
man  put  on  his  overcoat,  "  but  somehow 
or  other  I  feel  sorry  for  you.  Come  on." 

The  Major  had  not  quite  gone  to  seed, 
after  all.  He  slipped  his  little  arm  inside 
his  whilom  enemy's  huge  one  and  piloted 
his  faltering  steps  to  the  carriage.  Will 
iam  Penn  gave  Olney's  address  to  the 
driver. 


[282] 


XVIII 

ALICIA  left  her  father's  private  room 
with  no  very  clearly  defined  purpose 
in  her  mind.  It  did  not  occur  to  her  until 
she  reached  the  outer  office  that  she  really 
had  no  place  to  go  except  her  father's 
house.  Her  lover?  No,  he  could  never 
be  anything  to  her  again.  And  the  thought 
of  him  reminded  her  of  a  duty.  She  sat 
down  immediately  and  wrote  him  a  trem 
bling  note  which  she  despatched  by  a  pri 
vate  messenger  to  his  office.  She  was  con 
scious  of  a  dull  pain  in  her  final  confession 
which  only  confirmed  her  previous  renun 
ciation,  but  she  could  not  think  of  anything 
save  the  hideous  fact  that  she  was  a  negress. 
All  her  fine  theories  about  equality  van 
ished  in  the  instant  that  she  looked  at  them 
from  the  other  —  the  under-side. 

As  she  left  the  great  office  building  she 
noticed  the   carriage  standing  before   the 
[283] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

door.  She  dismissed  it  without  hesitation. 
She  would  have  nothing,  absolutely  noth 
ing,  that  had  been  given  her  by  her  father. 
The  clothes  she  stood  in,  no  more.  Where 
should  she  go?  There  was  but  one  place 
where,  were  the  truth  known,  she  would 
be  welcome.  She  walked  in  a  daze  through 
the  busy  streets  until  she  came  to  Olney's 
modest  rectory. 

'  Yes,  the  clergyman  was  in,"  said  the 
heat  maid-servant  who  opened  the  door; 
"  and  he  certainly  would  be  glad  to  see 
Miss  Chalden." 

The  woman,  as  did  all  her  race,  knew 
Alicia  and  what  she  had  done  for  them. 

"  Would  Miss  Chalden  go  into  the  par 
lor  and  wait?  " 

But  Alicia  asked  if  Olney  was  in  his 
study,  and,  on  receiving  an  affirmative 
answer,  said  she  would  go  there,  and  she 
would  not  trouble  the  maid  to  announce 
her.  She  brushed  past  the  astonished  girl, 
mounted  the  steps,  opened  the  door,  and 
entered  the  study. 

[284] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

OIney  was  on  his  knees.  There  was  a 
prayer-desk  in  one  corner.  His  head  was 
bowed  and  his  arms  were  stretched  straight 
before  him.  There  was  a  stillness  like 
death  in  the  room  when  Alicia  opened 
the  door.  The  priest  lifted  his  head  and 
stared  at  the  white  face  of  the  girl  as  if 
possessed. 

"  Alicia !  "  he  cried.  It  was  the  first 
time  he  had  addressed  her  thus,  and  he 
was  not  himself  or  he  would  have  used 
more  formal  words. 

"  It  is  true,"  said  the  girl,  "  my  father 
admitted  it." 

Her  voice  was  low  and  level  and  mo 
notonous,  without  passion.  It  was  as  if 
she  had  exhausted  the  variations  of  articu 
late  speech  with  the  anguish  which  had  left 
her  passive,  and  life  for  her  now  was  ex 
pressed  in  that  one  hopeless  minor  key. 

Olney  raised  himself  to  his  feet  and 
stepped  nearer  to  her. 

"  My  poor  girl!  "  he  murmured. 

"  I  have  broken  with  him.  I  have  cast 
[285] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

him  off.  There  was  no  other  place.  I 
came  here." 

"  Oh,  my  God,  Alicia,  you  should  not 
have  done  so  !  Couldn't  you " 

"  I  thought  you  loved  me,"  said  the 
girl. 

"  Alicia !  " 

"Don't  you?"  There  was  a  note  of 
subdued  alarm  in  her  voice.  "  How  could 

you,  the  daughter  of  a  liar,  a  scoundrel, 
a " 

"  Stop  !  "  cried  Olney.  "  My  father, 
my  mother.  Were  they  not  the  same? 
Are  not  all  people  of  mixed  blood  the  chil 
dren  of  shame  upon  shame?  My  God, 
sometimes  I  have  cursed  myself,  not  so 
much  because  of  the  helpless  black  blood, 
but  for  the  fifteen-sixteenths  of  evil 
white!" 

"  Yes,  yes,"  murmured  the  girl.  "  No 
doubt  you  are  right  from  your  standpoint. 
But  to  be  white,  any  kind  of  white,  and 
then  wake  up  and  find  —  and  find " 

"  I  know,"  said  the  man,  "  I  know." 
[286] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

He  took  her  hand  now. 

"  Alicia,"  he  cried.  "  No,  let  me  call 
you  Miss  Chalden.  You  are  to  me  what 
you  have  always  been.  The  best,  the 
sweetest,  the  purest,  the  noblest  of  women. 
Even  I  can  scarcely  understand  your  posi 
tion.  To  know  in  a  moment  what  I  have 
known  for  years  —  I  can  hardly  master 
it.  I  can  hardly  realize  the  shock  to  you. 
I  am  used  to  it.  I  did  not  mind  it  so 
much  until  I  met  you.  And  now  I  want 
to  do  for  you  everything  that  I  can.  I 
want  you  to  forget  my  personality  and  use 
me.  It  was  through  me  that  you  became 
possessed  of  this  dreadful  secret." 

"  It  would  have  become  known  in  any 
event,"  said  the  girl,  "  sooner  or  later. 
This  is  my  father's  weakness.  He  did  not 
realize  that  there  was  no  power  on  earth 
to  keep  such  a  thing  hidden." 

'  You  are  right.  But  I  want  to  make 
reparation.  I  want  to  help  you." 

"  I  want  no  sacrifice,"  said  the  girl,  look 
ing  at  him,  and  he  noticed  how  fierce  was 
[287] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

the  gleam  of  her  eyes  in  spite  of  her  dull 
face,  her  low  voice,  and  listless  manner. 
"  Will  you  swear  as  you  hope  for  heaven, 
if  there  is  such  a  place,  before  God,  if 
there  is  a  God,  to  tell  me  the  truth  ?  " 

"  I  will." 

"  Do  you  love  me?  " 

"  I  do,  with  all  my  soul." 

"  After  what  you  know?  " 

"  More  than  ever.  Why  should  that 
make  any  difference  to  me?  It  only  puts 
us  on  a  level." 

Alicia  winced  at  this  in  spite  of  herself, 
but  she  answered  bravely : 

'  I  do  not  love  you;  I  can  never  love 
again.  I  never  loved  anyone  but  Dr. 
Whyot,  and  now  him  least  of  all.  I  shall 
never  see  him  again." 

"Does  he  know?" 

'  Yes,  I  wrote  him.  But  I  respect  you. 
I  used  to  pity  you.  Now  I  know  some 
thing  of  what  you  feel.  If  you  will  take 
me,  if  you  will  marry  me,  I  —  I  —  we  will 
work  together  for  our  —  our — "  she  bit 
[288] 


A  DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

her  lip,  but  she  would  finish  the  sentence, 
"  our  people." 

Heaven  opened  before  the  vision  of  that 
man  as  he  heard  these  words.  But  because 
he  was  a  gentleman,  a  priest,  because  his 
love  for  her  was  sublimer  than  an  earthly 
passion,  he  stopped  her. 

"  Think,  Alicia.  You  propose  an  irrev 
ocable  step.  You  are  cutting  yourself  off 
from  the  last  possibility  of  return.  Once 
married  to  me  the  whole  world  will  know 
that  you  are  not  white.  There  must  be  no 
pretence " 

"  Nor  would  I  wish  any,"  interrupted 
the  girl,  "  else  I  had  not  been  here.  Come, 
we  are  made  for  each  other.  We  are  alike, 
we  are  alone.  I  have  no  one  but  you " 

"  Never  stoop  to  plead  with  me,"  cried 
the  man  passionately.  "  To  marry  you  is 
the  ambition,  the  desire  of  my  heart.  I 
only  hesitated  for  your  sake.  You  have 
decided,  so  be  it.  We  will  face  the  world 
—  together." 

"  I  am  glad,"  answered  Alicia  simply. 
[289] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  And  have  you  thought,  when " 

"  Let  it  be  at  once,"  said  the  girl;  "  you 
know  I  have  nothing.  These,"  she  con 
tinued,  lifting  her  purse  and  laying  it  on 
the  desk,  stripping  her  fingers  of  their 
rings,  taking  her  watch  from  her  dress 
and  placing  them  beside  it,  "  these  must  be 
returned  to  my  father.  I  wish  nothing  of 
him,  nothing.  This,  too,"  she  added, 
drawing  a  last  sparkling  diamond  from 
her  other  hand,  "  this  must  go  to  Dr. 
Whyot.  You  will  see  that  they  are  de 
livered?" 

"  I  will.  Alicia,"  he  cried,  gazing  at 
the  pretty  baubles,  a  new  thought  coming 
to  him,  "  you  shall  want  for  nothing.  I 
am  not  poor.  I  will  give  you  all.  I  can 
work." 

"  I  only  seek  a  refuge,  and  rest,"  said 
the  girl  wearily.  "  Let  us  go." 

"  Are  you  ready?  " 

"  Now  as  at  any  time." 

Olney  called  a  cab,  and  they  drove  to 
the  City  Hall,  procured  a  license,  went  to 
[290] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

one  of  the  man's  clerical  friends,  explained 
the  situation  briefly,  and  then  Alicia  Avery 
and  Henry  Olney  were  made  man  and 
wife.  She  had  scarcely  spoken  one  word 
from  the  time  they  left  the  house.  She 
had  been  as  one  dumb.  The  bride  had 
all  her  bridal  whiteness  in  her  face  as  they 
drove  back  to  the  rectory.  He  had  gained 
the  desire  of  his  heart,  but  the  manner  of 
gaining  lacked  all  that  he  had  wished  for. 
He  was  all  tenderness  and  consideration 
for  her  —  yet  he  was  her  husband.  There 
was  no  essential  racial  difference  between 
them.  Olney  had  not  ventured  upon  any 
caress.  In  the  little  study  once  more  he 
bent  down  to  kiss  her.  To  Alicia's  eyes 
the  lips  that  approached  her  cheek,  though 
as  finely  cut  as  her  own,  suddenly  took  on 
the  semblance  of  the  coarse,  thick  lips  of 
the  negro.  The  blackness  of  the  man,  un 
seen,  smote  her.  With  a  low  cry  the  girl 
shrank  back. 

"  Don't!  "  she  whispered.     "  Not  now. 
Wait." 

[291  ] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

Then  she  put  her  face  in  her  hands  and 
writhed  and  trembled  without  a  sound. 
Olney  understood,  and  his  heart  sickened 
within  him.  There  was  a  difference  after 
all!  What  was  the  present  situation?  He 
had  thought  to  save  her,  had  he  made  it 
worse?  His  heart  turned  to  stone  as  he 
looked  at  her  quivering  before  him.  Was 
the  old  prejudice  still  there  and  had  Alicia 
not  realized  it  after  all? 

"  Miss  Chalden,  Alicia,  I  mean,"  he 
said,  quietly,  with  the  old  self-repression, 
"  Alicia,  don't !  I  understand.  I  won't 
touch  you." 

"  Leave  me  alone  for  a  little  while. 
You  understand.  This  is  so  sudden  and 
strange  to  me.  I  will  be  brave.  I  didn't 
realize " 

She  looked  at  him  piteously,  so  piteous- 
ly,  that  he  half  forgot  the  pain  of  her 
avoidance. 

"  It  shall  be  as  you  wish,"  he  said  gen 
tly.  "  I  shall  leave  you  here  until  —  until 
you  send  for  me." 

[292] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

"  Thank  you,"  said  the  girl  gratefully, 
looking  at  him,  "  you  were  always  a  gen 
tleman." 

He  took  comfort  from  that.  There  was 
nothing  that  she  could  have  said  to  him 
that  could  have  satisfied  him  so  completely, 
unless  it  were  that  which  he  feared  she 
could  never  say: 

"  I  love  you." 


[293] 


XIX 

LEFT  alone  in  the  room  Alicia  sank 
down  in  the  arm-chair  in  front  of 
his  desk,  in  Olney's  chair!  She  had  seen 
him  sit  there  on  the  rare  occasions  when, 
in  company  with  others,  she  had  visited 
the  study  on  the  business  of  the  mission. 
In  Olney's  place !  Yes,  by  every  right  of 
ancestry  and  birth,  she  was  in  Olney's 
place.  And  she  was  his  wife!  For  the 
first  time  since  she  had  heard  the  news  that 
morning  Alicia  was  alone.  She  could  sit 
down  quietly  and  think  it  out  undisturbed. 
She  had  fathomed  the  terrible  situation 
to  its  very  depths.  She  had  exhausted 
anguish  and  despair  for  the  present,  and 
she  could  now  almost  consider  her  situa 
tion  dispassionately,  as  if  she  had  been  a 
stranger  looking  at  a  terrible  drama.  The 
shock  of  it  all  had  deadened  and  dulled 
her  sensibilities.  Now  she  seemed  to  feel 
[  294] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

no  pain.  She  could  exert  her  powers  of 
analysis  in  a  curious,  impersonal  way,  and 
she  wondered  at  what  result  she  had  ar 
rived. 

She  had  acted  promptly,  decisively,  upon 
the  information  she  had  received.  She  had 
spurned  her  father.  She  had  abandoned 
her  lover.  She  had  married  Olney.  There 
had  been  nothing  else  to  do.  The  propo 
sition  had  sprung  into  her  mind  that  he  and 
she,  outcasts,  social  pariahs,  as  they  were, 
could  work  together,  hand  in  hand,  for  the 
people  to  which  they  belonged.  She  had 
told  her  lover  she  could  not  marry  a  black 
man,  yet  she  had  done  so.  She  had  given 
the  last  proof  of  her  convictions,  but  not 
until,  and  only  because,  she  too  had  be 
come  a  negro.  What  next? 

She  was  Olney's  wife.  She,  Alicia  Chal- 
den,  was  the  wife  of  a  negro!  That  one 
fact  beat  into  her  brain,  only  that,  the  wife 
of  a  negro !  She  told  herself  that  she,  too, 
was  as  he.  That  they  were  just  the  same, 
and  yet  in  honesty  to  herself  she  was  forced 
[295  ] 


A  DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

to  admit  that  in  this  last  analysis  it  was 
not  so.  It  was  true  they  had  the  same 
percentage  of  black  blood  in  them,  but  Ol- 
ney  had  lived  his  life  in  the  full  conscious 
ness  of  the  fact,  which  he  had  known  from 
the  very  beginning.  He  had  realized  al 
ways,  under  all  circumstances,  that  he  was 
a  negro.  She  had  lived  her  life  without 
the  slightest  knowledge  of  it.  With  not 
even  the  faintest  suspicion  of  it. 

She  had  looked  at  life  from  the  stand 
point  of  the  master  race.  She  was  a  white 
woman,  with  all  her  race's  hopes,  dreams, 
thoughts,  aspirations,  with  the  white  wom 
an's  natural  affiliation  with  the  white  man, 
with  the  white  woman's  inherent  antago 
nism  for  the  black  man. 

Heredity?  It  was  nothing.  Environ 
ment?  It  was  everything.  Starting  from 
the  same  ground  it  had  made  her  white, 
him  black.  She  could  not  in  a  moment  un 
learn  the  lessons  of  a  lifetime.  Her  the 
ories  of  equality  failed  utterly  when  she 
had  to  make  a  personal  application  of 
[296] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

them.  Conscious  of  all  she  had  gone 
through,  she  could  not  escape  from  a  feel 
ing  of  superiority,  social  and  racial,  over 
powering  in  its  magnitude,  to  the  man  she 
had  married. 

At  least  there  were  shreds  and  tatters  of 
the  feeling  left,  and  it  was  fearfully  strong 
in  her,  it  overwhelmed  her.  The  late  en 
vironment  clung  to  her,  it  made  her  position 
unsupportable.  She  was  married  to  this 
man.  She  was  his  wife.  How  damnable 
was  the  iteration  of  that  constantly  recur 
rent  thought!  Until  death  did  them  part, 
and  no  one  could  put  them  asunder,  since 
God  had  joined  them.  Ah,  had  He? 
Was  this  His  work?  And  her  husband 
had  not  kissed  her,  but  only  because  he 
willed  not  to  do  so.  He  had  the  right. 
She  was  his.  She  belonged  to  him.  The 
white  woman  to  the  negro!  If  she  had 
known  of  it  always  it  would  have  been  dif 
ferent,  but  she  had  not  known.  Her  char 
acter  had  been  formed  on  white  lines,  his 
on  black.  The  situation  was  impossible. 
[297] 


A   DOCTOR   OF  PHILOSOPHY 

There  must  be  an  escape.  She  must  go 
away. 

But  where  could  she  go?  She  thought 
of  her  father  with  contempt.  She  thought 
of  the  race  to  which  she  was  inexorably 
condemned  with  a  fierce  loathing,  a  more 
intense  repulsion;  in  that  repulsion  she  in 
cluded,  in  spite  of  herself,  her  husband. 
Yes,  he  was  a  gentleman ;  but,  just  heaven, 
he  was  a  negro !  She  —  she  —  was  a 
white  woman.  The  years  of  her  life  had 
implanted  the  consciousness  of  that,  and 
the  consciousness  remained  in  the  face  of 
her  recent  knowledge.  What  could  she 
do? 

Alicia's  mental  and  moral  faculties  were 
reeling  on  their  throne.  She  felt  unable  to 
discriminate  in  her  dull  confusion  between 
right  and  wrong.  Were  they  only  words, 
words,  after  all?  How  could  she,  a  child 
of  crime,  of  sin,  of  infamy,  of  iniquity,  for 
Satan  knew  how  many  generations  back, 
be  held  accountable  for  what  she  did?  She 
was  not  a  free  moral  agent.  Some  malign 
[298] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

fate  against  which  it  was  useless  to  battle 
had  brought  about  this  state  of  affairs. 
She  was  damned,  whether  in  life  or  death 
—  what  mattered  it? 

Alicia  was  mad,  at  last.  That  throne 
had  been  vacated.  The  poor  soul  was 
empty  —  swept  and  garnished !  Of  one 
thing  only  was  she  conscious,  upon  one 
thing  only  was  she  determined.  She  would 
never,  never,  in  heaven,  or  earth,  or  hell, 
be  his  wife!  But  how  escape? 

On  the  desk  by  her  side  lay  an  ancient 
Spanish  dagger  of  marvellous  workman 
ship.  Olney  used  it  for  a  paper-knife. 
Some  travelled  friend  had  brought  it  to 
him.  She  took  it  up  in  her  hand,  un 
sheathed  it.  Her  eyes  scanned  the  pol 
ished  blade.  It  quivered  in  her  trembling 
fingers.  The  steel  in  the  sunlight  wavered 
before  her  vision  like  a  white  flame. 

There  were  voices  in  the  hall  below, 
steps  on  the  stair.  Now  or  never.  Alicia 
lifted  her  arm. 

;'  Will !  "  she  whispered,  and  then,  open- 
[299] 


A  DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

eyed,  implacable,  urged  thereto  by  re 
morseless  fate,  she  drove  home  the  lethal 
weapon  with  all  the  force  left  in  her. 

"  Thank  God!  "  she  cried,  in  exaltation, 
as  she  delivered  the  blow,  returning  — 
heaven  be  praised  —  in  that  fleeting  in 
stant  of  exquisite  physical  pain,  to  the 
belief  of  her  lifetime,  the  confidence  of  a 
certain  faith,  and  in  the  Article  of  Death 
calling  upon  His  Name.  She  swayed  a 
moment  or  two.  The  red  blood  spurted 
about  the  dagger  hilt.  It  was  the  same 
poor  human  blood  that  fills  the  veins  of 
every  child  of  God.  Her  resolution  kept 
her  erect  for  the  moment.  She  swiftly  re 
membered  she  had  a  prayer  to  make  before 
she  went;  she  made  it  in  one  breaking 
word: 

"  Mercy!" 

That  was  all.  Who  shall  say  that  she 
did  not  receive  it? 

The  door  was  thrown  open.  Thrusting 
aside  Olney,  who  had  shown  the  way,  Doc 
tor  Whyot  burst  into  the  room.  The  old 
[300] 


A   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 

supremacy  of  the  white  race,  thought  tke 
priest  bitterly  —  yet  he  gave  way.  Hard 
after  the  two  came  the  Major,  and  last  of 
all  Alicia's  father.  In  bitterness  of  heart 
he  had  planned  his  assault  upon  society,  he 
had  thirsted  for  his  revenge,  and  in  bitter 
ness  of  heart  he  saw  it  there,  at  his  feet. 

"  She  has  fainted,"  cried  Doctor  Whyot, 
kneeling  down  and  turning  her  over. 

He  recoiled  with  horror  at  what  he  saw. 

"Dead!  Good  God!  Alicia!"  he 
said,  taking  her  in  his  arms. 

And  again  Olney,  with  a  stopped  heart, 
gave  way.  Not  even  in  death  was  she  to 
be  his.  He  realized  the  situation  before 
the  others,  he  loved  the  most. 

No  one  spoke.  They  were  appalled, 
bound,  stricken.  At  her  lover's  touch 
Alicia  opened  her  eyes.  Her  glance  swept 
them  all,  the  Major  at  her  side  indiffer 
ently;  her  father,  was  it  in  forgiveness? 
her  husband,  was  it  in  pity?  and  Doctor 
Whyot  —  ay,  surely,  there  was  love !  But 
she  said  nothing.  She  was  past  all  speech, 
[3°!  ] 


A   DOCTOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY 

all  suffering  now.  She  only  closed  her 
eyes  —  forever.  They  had  come  too  late. 
It  was  over. 

There  at  their  feet  was  the  poor  little 
Doctor  of  Philosophy. 

Society  was  there,  with  its  master, 
Money,  and  its  servant,  Science,  and  its 
protagonist,  Love:  the  rules  and  regula 
tions,  the  artificial  conventionalities,  the 
wisdom  and  the  folly  of  the  one;  the  power 
for  good  or  evil  of  the  other;  the  knowl 
edge  and  certitude,  the  calm  impassivity  of 
the  third;  the  passionate  self-sacrifice  of 
the  greatest  and  last  —  they  were  all  there. 
Collectively  or  singly,  they  were  alike  help 
less.  They  could  do  nothing,  nothing,  in 
the  face  of  such  a  problem.  Alicia  herself 
had  found  the  only  solution. 

And  at  their  feet  she  lay,  a  mute,  eter 
nal  protest. 


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THE    SOUTHERNERS 

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"A  book  of  unusual  merit." — The  Independent. 

"  Full    of  spirit   and   continuously   interesting." 
— Neu>  York  Times  Review. 

"A  brave  story,  bravely  told." — Commercial  Ad 
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"  A  solid,  straightforward  piece  of  work." — Chi 
cago  Evening  Post. 

"Shows  a  more  searching  knowledge  of  the  inner 
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THE   GRIP   OF   HONOR 

A  Romance  of  Paul  Jones  and 

the  American  Revolution 

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A  romantic  love  affair  forms  the  body  of  the  book, 
and  it  is  a  thrilling  story,  upholding  a  high  ideal. 
There  is  not  a  dull  page  in  it." — Congregationalist. 


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FOR  THE  FREEDOM  OF 
THE  SEA 

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the  lessons  inculcated  are  of  the  highest." 

— New  York  Times. 

"  An  intensely  patriotic  tale.  ...  It  shows 
a  careful  study  of  manners  and  social  conditions  as 
well  as  of  military  history.  Battles  on  sea  and  land 
are  described  with  dramatic  effect." — The  Outlook. 


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UNDER  TOPS'  LS  AND  TENTS 

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latest  book  as  in  his  first.  .  .  .  Essentially  the 
book  is  a  reflection  of  the  author's  experiences  as 
a  naval  cadet  at  Annapolis,  and  on  the  school- 
ships,  and  as  a  Chaplain  in  camp  and  at  the  front 
during  the  war  with  Spain.  Mr.  Brady  turns  the 
kaleidoscope  of  memory  with  pleasing  and  often 
dramatic  effect,  and  his  stories  are  sweetened  by 
the  suggestion  of  the  humane  and  cheery  person 
ality  behind  them."  —  The  Dial. 

"  The  Archdeacon's  spirits  never  flag  and  he 
carries  the  reader  with  him  by  sheer  force  of 

vivacity."  —  New  York  Herald. 


RECOLLECTIONS    OF    A    MIS 
SIONARY  IN  THE  GREAT  WEST 


"  As  a  photographic  delineation  of  the  raw 
pioneering  life,  which  ere  long  will  have  given  place 
to  the  ripened  product  of  well-settled  conditions, 
it  has  a  permanent  historical  value.  As  a  sketch 
of  hardy  men  and  women  it  is  full  of  a  dramatic 
interest."  —  The  Outlook. 


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BOYS  OF  THE    SERVICE 


IN    THE    WAR   WITH    MEXICO 

A  Midshipman's  Adventures 

on  Ship  and  Shore 
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Ned  Demon,  son  of  Ned  Denton  of  the  Wasp's 
Nest,  and  his  two  sailor  comrades,  ashore  as  well 
as  afloat,  afford,  also,  a  striking  panorama  of  our 
war  with  Mexico ;  and  it  is  a  question  whether 
his  experiences  aboard  the  U.  S.  S.  Somers,  with 
the  story  of  the  mutiny  and  the  account  of  her 
wreck,  or  his  march  with  Scott  upon  the  City 
of  Mexico,  are  the  more  absorbing.  The  reader 
meets,  in  the  beginnings  of  their  careers,  Grant, 
Lee,  McClellan,  Beauregard,  Kearney,  and  other 
famous  generals  of  a  later  period,  and  Mr.  Brady 
pictures  them  graphically  and  truly.  It  is  a  book 
deeply  to  interest  any  boy,  not  only  in  the  story 
but  in  the  period  and  the  history 
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Charles  Scribner's  Sons,  Publishers 

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